Band Of Brothers 10

[Helen Drewski]

Thisepisode always gets shafted, being sandwiched between the 2 best episodes of the series. But it's very solid on its own merits, and I want to give some credit to the design people for making the city they were stationed in feel just as worn our and tired as the men themselves. I just really remember thinking the production design on this episode was like the best version of a Call of Duty mission.

-DamnYankees

I think of all episodes that benefit from a re-watching of BoB, this is the one that benefits most. It showcases several characters that have been mostly background players, one totally new character and one character who was not seen for several episodes. I remember when first watching The Last Patrol, I had thought that Webb was introduced out of the blue and given a backstory (a-la Nikki and Paolo from Lost) and could not believe the character was actually around at the beginning of the series -- and now he's even getting the voice-over treatment? Upon a second viewing, however, things just fit into place a lot more. The men of the second platoon are recognizable, even if some are one-note, like Cobb. The weight of Bastogne wearing on the Toccoa men -- Malarky in particular and their hostility toward Webb and Jones all make much more sense. One thing I didn't appreciate so much was Lutz turning into the company's Klinger in the face of such depressing moments for the rest of the company, especially the men who were picked to go on patrol.

I liked the casting of Colin Hanks. The character is a West Pointer who graduated with well admired and very powerful General Eisenhower's son/grandson, which connected with the nepotism of casting the son of one of the well admired producers of the miniseries. Plus, the casting of a son of a great, probably eventually legendary actor, also gave me the impression of a generational gulf between veterans of Normandy/Holland/Bastogne (the "greatest generation" and soldiers who experienced war thereafter ("baby boomer"). Of course, the comparison is flawed, but that's the impression I got. Also I read way too much into casting.

Alan, when do you think the review will be up for Why We Fight? The moment you anounced this little re-watch, my first thought was I want to see what you have to say about episode 9. Very much looking forward to the review, and I suppose watching it, though its not easy to watch.

-DamnYankees

Alan, is it kosher to discuss Lt. Jones' eventual fate, given that we won't see him again? I think it's pertinent relative to a motif that will come up again in "Points".

I didn't mind Webster as much in this episode as I did in "Why We Fight" - that's really where the character starts to run off the rails for me, and it's less about Eion Bailey's performance (I think he does the best he can with what he's given) than with the fact that Webster is thrust so prominently back into the action so unexpectedly, and he's right there for the remainder of the series.

Yeah, I was confused when he was the central figure here too, because so much had happened since he left that I had more or less forgotten him. However, I really, really like him. He's cerebral, and certainly very afraid for his own life, but he's not a bad soldier, and after he goes on patrol you can see even Liebgott warm to him, along with Martin telling Cobb to shut up when he takes pointless shots at Webster for being a "college boy." I probably identify with the English major in him (as much as I identify with the smartass in Luz), but I dig him.

I forgot to mention this in the review of "The Breaking Point," but that episode was the one that made me finally retreat to Wikipedia to see who lived, and I was surprised to see the timeline for Webster. I'll keep mum, but I was glad that at least this somewhat peculiar character would be around until the end.

I love Nixon's reaction to Jones. That laugh and then, "Don't get hurt" is classic.

Jones and Webster ducking and hiding their way to the place where 2nd platoon is holed up while everyone else just walks around in the open, and then Malarkey's indifference to Jones telling him about the mortars, is a nice touch too.

For those who didn't know - Lt. Jones was killed in car accident just days after he transferred out of Easy Company. It further illustrates what will become a key motif in "Points" - that even though the war is winding down, and the men are doing the best they can to stay out of combat, casualties are going to happen, and they're going to happen in the most random and unfair ways.

Also, an interesting moment illustrating the contrast between Jones the West Point grad, and Dike, the Ivy Leaguer - Dike wears his class ring like it's a beacon, where Jones has the presence of mind to take the ring off before the company goes on patrol and put it on his dog tags chain to wear around his neck.

Alyson, someone on the Wild Bill Guarnere board said that, while Winters said Jones died in a car crash, he wasn't sure on the date, and it seems like it was well after these events, if not after the war altogether.

Alan - you're correct that my timeline is off, but apparently not by too much; according to this forum: -television/27072-lafayette-escadrille-band-brothers-connection.html

Jones died in a Jeep accident while still overseas in '47.

I think the point still stands though - the other shoe is going to drop for a couple of these guys still, made even more horrifying and frustrating by the fact that they're thisclose to finally going home.

I think this episode is very underrated. My only complaint was that Easy saw a lot more action immediately after Foy. I would have liked to see what occurred there.

My random thoughts:

- Did you guys heed my note from the last episode and pay attention the buildings? Every city scene, Carentan, Eindhoven, Bastogne, Foy, Hagenau and outside Landsberg used this set.

- Notice when Lt. Jones tries to restrain one of the soldiers after the patrol by sitting in the chair they both actually knock heads. Later on Jones's swelled up pretty good.

- This episode further proves that the Cobb character was created to carry the burden of all the negative traits of a combat soldier. Lt. Welsh was a brawler and kept getting into trouble. We never see evidence of that in the series.

- Does anybody get why they all were laughing when they ran into the basement? Were they playing a joke on Lt. Jones?

- Officers would not have been standing on the riverbank like they did. Snipers would have picked them off.

I definitely agree about the officers standing by the river bank in the light of day -- I guess setting the scene from inside a third story room with a window wouldn't have been as effective.

In regards to the laughing soldiers in the basement and other 'lighter' moment from this episode, I got a real Catch-22/absurdity of war vibe from it all. Did anyone else?

I would like to rank this episode much higher than I do, but I can't seem to get past my dislike of two characters prominently featured in this episode: Webster and Jones.

I don't know if it's the actors that portray them or what, but I don't have nearly the same amount of affection for them or their characters as I do for even minor characters featured in other episodes.

Loved how Winters disobeyed Sink's command in order to make sure Easy remained safe.

Thanks again, Alan for a great post.

I like all of the episodes, although this particular one took a lot of liberties with fairly important details of the actual events. For those interested in seeing an earlier edition of the script, you can find it here: It's quite different from what ended up on the screen, and somewhat closer to real-life events in terms of what happened with the patrol itself.

Re: Webster, it's fairly clear that the miniseries is a semi-fictionalized account based upon a blend of Ambrose's original book, Webster's then-unpublished manuscript, and feedback from some of the various vets, such as Malarkey and Winters. The end result is a blend of the positive from Webster and Ambrose and the negative from the others, with an apparent emphasis on the negative.

It appears that those who felt most negatively about him also happened to be behind the scenes in the making of the miniseries. Malarkey's book "Easy Company Soldier," published recently, exhibits a lot of contempt for Webster, which comes through loud and clear in the miniseries, while Winters claimed dismissively in his own autobiography that he couldn't remember who he was. Mark Bando's website precedes the publication of a lot of the subsequent books, so his fuming about inaccuracies may in part come from the fact that he didn't have all of that information. (He also seems upset that Dale Dye was hired as the consultant, instead of him.)

It's not my place to take sides, but it appears to me that Webster wanted to lead the writer's life, more so than anything else. (He was a fine writer, so that's understandable.) He wanted to experience the war largely as an observer who could document it, not to be a hero. He was admittedly a poor shot. He hated the army, and although he empathized with the enlisted men more than the officers, he didn't really relate to many of them, either. I have my doubts that he was ever one of the guys.

His opponents viewed him as a goldbrick, and presumably believed him to be a snob. They may also be somewhat dishonest in not admitting that they may have also viewed him negatively because they saw him as a replacement, and replacements often got no respect.

Unlike what the character says during his VO in this episode, Webster joined E Company after Normandy, so he would have been with the unit for only a short time before he was wounded on "The Island." (Webster volunteered to switch because he wanted to see more combat. He surely could have been an officer had he wanted to, given his education and intelligence.) It's probably not surprising that Winters would have barely known him; he would have had little reason to interact with a PFC replacement.

3a8082e126