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Published On: Dec 27, 2005 07:45 AM
Total entries in this category:
Published On: Dec 27, 2005 07:45 AM
Over There?
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/tv/233932_over26.html
Review:
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/tv/233923_tv26.html
Review:
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/tv/233923_tv26.html
Here is a Seattle PI article capturing
the comments of Camp Murray in Tacoma Iraq vets on the new FX TV series. I'm
gagging that someone would even consider portraying the war in this way.
Following is the PI's review of the piece.
Tuesday, July 26, 2005
These soldiers say 'Over There' is 'bogus'
By M.L. LYKE
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER
A truck tire hits a flagged wire, a roadside bomb explodes, a handsome private with shredded leg screams in agony. In the bloody chaos of the moment, his soldier buddies panic. One pukes.
Stop the cameras! Sir! Lt. Eva Sovelenko
Gilbert W. Arias / P-I
In a preview of "Over There" at Camp Murray in Tacoma, 1st Lt. Eva Sovelenko reacts to a scene as Sgt. John Figueroa looks on.
THe look on Lt. Sovelenko's face says it all.
"People don't act like that when an i.e.d. (improvised explosive device) goes off. They make us look like idiots. We're not idiots!" said a first lieutenant previewing "Over There," the new TV series from Steven Bochco ("NYPD Blue," "Hill Street Blues") that debuts tomorrow night on FX cable network. It's set in Iraq, hyped as "true to life" by producers and hailed by critics as "unflinching" and "gut-wrenching."
"Bogus" was the preferred adjective among the eight soldiers -- most of them Iraq vets -- viewing the series pilot last week at Camp Murray, headquarters of the Washington State National Guard in Tacoma.
"Thank God that's over," said a master sergeant as the credits rolled.
The uniformed skeptics dissected the series pilot scene by scene, beginning with the roadside bombing and panicked soldiers. Who, they asked, was pulling security? And what kind of idiot pulls off his helmet after a bombing attack? "In real life, training takes over. Not in Hollywood," said Sgt. Dan Purcell.
The flags on the trip wires got an "F": roadside bombs in Iraq are typically hidden in watermelons, hay stacks, animal carcasses -- not marked for easy viewing. "A flag to mark an i.e.d.? What is that -- like don't land here?"
Truck drivers also got eight thumbs down. "You do not, under any circumstances, pull off on the side of the road. You stop in the middle."
The TV series, filmed in California, follows an Army infantry squad, flashing between soldiers' experiences in-country and the impact of their deployment back home in the States. It's billled as the first war drama built around a U.S. military conflict still in progress, a war with death tolls mounting daily.
Bochco, who co-created the series with Chris Gerolmo ("Mississippi Burning"), has stated in interviews that the show is apolitical. "Ultimately, a young man being shot at in a firefight has absolutely no interest in politics," he told Reuters news service.
But some camo-clad critics at Camp Murray were left wondering just what the message was in "Over There." One said a young soldier who brags about slitting the throat of a child sentry "makes us look like murderers."
Master Sgt. Jeff Clayton complained that cameras deliberately dragged out the death scenes of Iraqi insurgents after a firefight, lingering unnecessarily on the carnage. "It made me sick."
And where, soldiers asked, were the scenes of soldiers building schools, Iraqi kids waving American flags?
The fast-paced premiere is packed with sex, drugs, rock 'n' roll; cool explosions and close-up gore; cussing and wrought emotion. It opens with the soldiers' goodbyes to family and a nervous flight to Iraq. In an instant -- "Yeah, right" -- the new dudes are belly-down in sand in front of a mosque full of insurgents, with two women accidentally trapped in the trenches, one with a big attitude and little common sense.
"I can do it myself!" she yells at a soldier who tries to help her dig a trench. "You deaf soldier?" It's night, she's totally exposed to enemy fire and, when it starts, it's boy-soldier who has to push her head down to save her.
No wonder the men keep asking, "What do we do about the women?"
"I did not like the way the show presents men's opinion of women -- they act like the women were some other species," said Lt. Connie Woodyard, who returned from Iraq earlier this year. "We're not cowards. Women in Iraq are doing amazing things."
The Camp Murray soldiers dismissed the military firefights as "bull---- " ("Where is the air support? Where is the armor support?"), the dialogue as contrived ("It sucked") and plot drivers as pure Hollywood.
# In the script, characters are thrown together for the first time. They constantly ask each other to explain nicknames. In real life, soldiers are sent to Iraq in units. "They don't have to ask each other's nicknames. They all know each other."
# After one week in-country, the soldier-actors mull life and death and war in eloquent speeches home to loved ones, talking about how war unmasks the monster within. "Nobody is that reflective after one week in-country. It's more like, "Ohmigod, we're in Iraq. Hi. What the hell am I doing here?"
A few scenes passed muster. Heads nodded when a soldier opened up a packet of Taster's Choice freeze-dried and downed the whole thing. Nice detail. Ditto the scene of the earnest soldier describing the horrors of war via computer video e-mail as his adulterous wife is writhing in ecstasy with lover-boy back home.
"But after only a week?" commented one soldier.
"It usually takes at least two," added another.
One scene hit home for the tough audience: an intimate close-up of two African American soldiers talking band-of-brother bonds. Says one: "If you're looking for another fool to risk getting shot to cover your fool behind, I'm right here beside you."
Correct! Sir!
Only one of the camo-clad critics, Sgt. John Figueroa, who is awaiting call-up orders to Afghanistan, said he'd watch it.
"Hey, I'm into Hollywood," he said, shrugging.
P-I reporter M.L. Lyke can be reached at 206-448-8344 or m.l.lyke@seattlepi.com.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/tv/233932_over26.html
Here is the official Seattle PI review:
Once it gets rolling, 'Over There' could spell victory for FX
By MELANIE McFARLAND
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER TELEVISION CRITIC
Forget excapism. Forget the idea of switching off from the real world for an hour, of escaping bad news and the world's ills. Forget everything that prime-time television entertainment is supposed to be about, even with all of its ripped-from-the-headlines procedurals.
Forget it all if you plan to watch "Over There," because that frame of mind is counterintuitive to the drama's mission.
Instead, "NYPD Blue's" executive producer Steve Bochco and Chris Gerolmo want to bring into our living rooms the emotional grind, the heroism and horrors American troops are living with at this very moment. Many documentaries endeavor to do the same thing, but "Over There" is the first scripted drama about the Iraq war.
And with most of the action taking place after 10 p.m. Wednesdays on cable's FX, the rough, explicit visuals will be too much for some people to take. Tomorrow night's pilot contains scenes of unvarnished gore, including one insurgent having the top half of his body blown off and a soldier taking a devastating injury from an improvised explosive device.
There are moments of naked humanity, as in the second episode, when one man realizes he has claimed the life of an innocent in the course of doing his job. And there's Bochco's specialty, dialogue that speaks to fears within most hearts.
"An enemy who's not afraid to die," one of the recruits whispers in horrified wonder. "Jesus, how can you fight that?"
To rephrase the question to fit a viewer's perspective -- Jesus, how can you watch that?
Actually, it's easy to watch "Over There" if you enjoy adventurous television that's not afraid to fire off a few emotional shots to the gut. That it does, quite thoughtfully at times, and it's unafraid to push boundaries, be they the medium's or that of the audience. It is, to put it plainly, smart and precise television, but it takes about three episodes to realize that.
There's a lot to overcome with the very premise of "Over There," which makes the clunky exposition bogging down tomorrow night's pilot difficult to take. Granted, there are a lot of characters to introduce, and the constant threat of losing a few as the series wears on, but the content is dark enough without having to figure out how a soldier called Dim got his nickname.
This is not the only reason "Over There" is not, say, "Band of Brothers." Nobody knows how the real war will end, and it will take years -- we're talking decades after the troops have pulled out and Iraq is standing on its own legs -- until we accurately can pass judgment on the war's historical impact.
Without a resolution in the real conflict to draw upon, the audience is challenged to find a sense of the characters' personal ideas of glory and honor in war. Aware of this, Bochco and Gerolmo present balanced, truthful navigation of the conflict's visceral moments, delivered through the perspective of a team of new recruits and the families they've left at home.
There's no scarcity of drama to work with, because the unit is far from cohesive. Issues of racism and emotional instability crop up in the heat of battle, and the soldiers' reactions at seeing other human beings dying at their hands can break your heart.
This comes into full focus in next week's episode, "Roadblock Duty," which should be considered the true beginning of the series. The mistakes the men make are devastating, but success doesn't look, or feel, any better.Adding their families to the story line helps soften "Over There's" roughest edges.
The pilot is the weakest of the first three episodes; the third is the strongest. If "Over There" continues along this positive trajectory through its 13 episodes, it may end its season being FX's most gripping and fantastic series yet.
As for the series' battle to win viewers with such tough subject matter, victory is all too uncertain.
P-I TV critic Melanie McFarland can be reached at 206-448-8015 or tvgal@seattlepi.com.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/tv/233923_tv26.html
Tuesday, July 26, 2005
These soldiers say 'Over There' is 'bogus'
By M.L. LYKE
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER
A truck tire hits a flagged wire, a roadside bomb explodes, a handsome private with shredded leg screams in agony. In the bloody chaos of the moment, his soldier buddies panic. One pukes.
Stop the cameras! Sir! Lt. Eva Sovelenko
Gilbert W. Arias / P-I
In a preview of "Over There" at Camp Murray in Tacoma, 1st Lt. Eva Sovelenko reacts to a scene as Sgt. John Figueroa looks on.
THe look on Lt. Sovelenko's face says it all.
"People don't act like that when an i.e.d. (improvised explosive device) goes off. They make us look like idiots. We're not idiots!" said a first lieutenant previewing "Over There," the new TV series from Steven Bochco ("NYPD Blue," "Hill Street Blues") that debuts tomorrow night on FX cable network. It's set in Iraq, hyped as "true to life" by producers and hailed by critics as "unflinching" and "gut-wrenching."
"Bogus" was the preferred adjective among the eight soldiers -- most of them Iraq vets -- viewing the series pilot last week at Camp Murray, headquarters of the Washington State National Guard in Tacoma.
"Thank God that's over," said a master sergeant as the credits rolled.
The uniformed skeptics dissected the series pilot scene by scene, beginning with the roadside bombing and panicked soldiers. Who, they asked, was pulling security? And what kind of idiot pulls off his helmet after a bombing attack? "In real life, training takes over. Not in Hollywood," said Sgt. Dan Purcell.
The flags on the trip wires got an "F": roadside bombs in Iraq are typically hidden in watermelons, hay stacks, animal carcasses -- not marked for easy viewing. "A flag to mark an i.e.d.? What is that -- like don't land here?"
Truck drivers also got eight thumbs down. "You do not, under any circumstances, pull off on the side of the road. You stop in the middle."
The TV series, filmed in California, follows an Army infantry squad, flashing between soldiers' experiences in-country and the impact of their deployment back home in the States. It's billled as the first war drama built around a U.S. military conflict still in progress, a war with death tolls mounting daily.
Bochco, who co-created the series with Chris Gerolmo ("Mississippi Burning"), has stated in interviews that the show is apolitical. "Ultimately, a young man being shot at in a firefight has absolutely no interest in politics," he told Reuters news service.
But some camo-clad critics at Camp Murray were left wondering just what the message was in "Over There." One said a young soldier who brags about slitting the throat of a child sentry "makes us look like murderers."
Master Sgt. Jeff Clayton complained that cameras deliberately dragged out the death scenes of Iraqi insurgents after a firefight, lingering unnecessarily on the carnage. "It made me sick."
And where, soldiers asked, were the scenes of soldiers building schools, Iraqi kids waving American flags?
The fast-paced premiere is packed with sex, drugs, rock 'n' roll; cool explosions and close-up gore; cussing and wrought emotion. It opens with the soldiers' goodbyes to family and a nervous flight to Iraq. In an instant -- "Yeah, right" -- the new dudes are belly-down in sand in front of a mosque full of insurgents, with two women accidentally trapped in the trenches, one with a big attitude and little common sense.
"I can do it myself!" she yells at a soldier who tries to help her dig a trench. "You deaf soldier?" It's night, she's totally exposed to enemy fire and, when it starts, it's boy-soldier who has to push her head down to save her.
No wonder the men keep asking, "What do we do about the women?"
"I did not like the way the show presents men's opinion of women -- they act like the women were some other species," said Lt. Connie Woodyard, who returned from Iraq earlier this year. "We're not cowards. Women in Iraq are doing amazing things."
The Camp Murray soldiers dismissed the military firefights as "bull---- " ("Where is the air support? Where is the armor support?"), the dialogue as contrived ("It sucked") and plot drivers as pure Hollywood.
# In the script, characters are thrown together for the first time. They constantly ask each other to explain nicknames. In real life, soldiers are sent to Iraq in units. "They don't have to ask each other's nicknames. They all know each other."
# After one week in-country, the soldier-actors mull life and death and war in eloquent speeches home to loved ones, talking about how war unmasks the monster within. "Nobody is that reflective after one week in-country. It's more like, "Ohmigod, we're in Iraq. Hi. What the hell am I doing here?"
A few scenes passed muster. Heads nodded when a soldier opened up a packet of Taster's Choice freeze-dried and downed the whole thing. Nice detail. Ditto the scene of the earnest soldier describing the horrors of war via computer video e-mail as his adulterous wife is writhing in ecstasy with lover-boy back home.
"But after only a week?" commented one soldier.
"It usually takes at least two," added another.
One scene hit home for the tough audience: an intimate close-up of two African American soldiers talking band-of-brother bonds. Says one: "If you're looking for another fool to risk getting shot to cover your fool behind, I'm right here beside you."
Correct! Sir!
Only one of the camo-clad critics, Sgt. John Figueroa, who is awaiting call-up orders to Afghanistan, said he'd watch it.
"Hey, I'm into Hollywood," he said, shrugging.
P-I reporter M.L. Lyke can be reached at 206-448-8344 or m.l.lyke@seattlepi.com.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/tv/233932_over26.html
Here is the official Seattle PI review:
Once it gets rolling, 'Over There' could spell victory for FX
By MELANIE McFARLAND
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER TELEVISION CRITIC
Forget excapism. Forget the idea of switching off from the real world for an hour, of escaping bad news and the world's ills. Forget everything that prime-time television entertainment is supposed to be about, even with all of its ripped-from-the-headlines procedurals.
Forget it all if you plan to watch "Over There," because that frame of mind is counterintuitive to the drama's mission.
Instead, "NYPD Blue's" executive producer Steve Bochco and Chris Gerolmo want to bring into our living rooms the emotional grind, the heroism and horrors American troops are living with at this very moment. Many documentaries endeavor to do the same thing, but "Over There" is the first scripted drama about the Iraq war.
And with most of the action taking place after 10 p.m. Wednesdays on cable's FX, the rough, explicit visuals will be too much for some people to take. Tomorrow night's pilot contains scenes of unvarnished gore, including one insurgent having the top half of his body blown off and a soldier taking a devastating injury from an improvised explosive device.
There are moments of naked humanity, as in the second episode, when one man realizes he has claimed the life of an innocent in the course of doing his job. And there's Bochco's specialty, dialogue that speaks to fears within most hearts.
"An enemy who's not afraid to die," one of the recruits whispers in horrified wonder. "Jesus, how can you fight that?"
To rephrase the question to fit a viewer's perspective -- Jesus, how can you watch that?
Actually, it's easy to watch "Over There" if you enjoy adventurous television that's not afraid to fire off a few emotional shots to the gut. That it does, quite thoughtfully at times, and it's unafraid to push boundaries, be they the medium's or that of the audience. It is, to put it plainly, smart and precise television, but it takes about three episodes to realize that.
There's a lot to overcome with the very premise of "Over There," which makes the clunky exposition bogging down tomorrow night's pilot difficult to take. Granted, there are a lot of characters to introduce, and the constant threat of losing a few as the series wears on, but the content is dark enough without having to figure out how a soldier called Dim got his nickname.
This is not the only reason "Over There" is not, say, "Band of Brothers." Nobody knows how the real war will end, and it will take years -- we're talking decades after the troops have pulled out and Iraq is standing on its own legs -- until we accurately can pass judgment on the war's historical impact.
Without a resolution in the real conflict to draw upon, the audience is challenged to find a sense of the characters' personal ideas of glory and honor in war. Aware of this, Bochco and Gerolmo present balanced, truthful navigation of the conflict's visceral moments, delivered through the perspective of a team of new recruits and the families they've left at home.
There's no scarcity of drama to work with, because the unit is far from cohesive. Issues of racism and emotional instability crop up in the heat of battle, and the soldiers' reactions at seeing other human beings dying at their hands can break your heart.
This comes into full focus in next week's episode, "Roadblock Duty," which should be considered the true beginning of the series. The mistakes the men make are devastating, but success doesn't look, or feel, any better.Adding their families to the story line helps soften "Over There's" roughest edges.
The pilot is the weakest of the first three episodes; the third is the strongest. If "Over There" continues along this positive trajectory through its 13 episodes, it may end its season being FX's most gripping and fantastic series yet.
As for the series' battle to win viewers with such tough subject matter, victory is all too uncertain.
P-I TV critic Melanie McFarland can be reached at 206-448-8015 or tvgal@seattlepi.com.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/tv/233923_tv26.html
Posted: Tue - July 26, 2005 at 08:51 AM