Chapo's Matt and Felix Review Band of Brothers (Time for my Stories)

Time for my Stories is a podcast about analyzing TV shows hosted by Matt Christman and Felix Biederman from Chapo Trap House. Previously only available through a now-defunct app, this show is now at risk of becoming lost media.
"Band of Brothers" tells the story of Easy Company, 506th Regiment of the 101st Airborne Division, U.S. Army. Based on interviews with survivors of Easy Company, as well as soldiers' journals and letters, this 10-part series chronicles the experiences of these young men who knew extraordinary bravery and extraordinary fear. Based on the book written by Stephen Ambrose.
#chapotraphouse #bandofbrothers #hbo #review #politicalpodcast

[@garcalej]

When I think of BoB and the WW2 genre, I often think of the opening fore-word to Kurt Vonnegut’s “Slaughterhouse Five.” Vonnegut, who fought in the Battle of the Bulge, was captured, and witnessed the firebombing of Dresden, described visiting a war buddy in another city to go over the details of the book. His old comrade greets him warmly but his wife seems to want nothing to do with him. Through nearly the whole visit she is cold and hostile, until finally, Kurt asks her what her deal is. She tells it to him straight: she knows he’s writing a book, and that the book will be about the war. She reckons it’s going to be some rollicking tale of bravery or violent piece of nihilistic war porn. In any case, the result will be the same: a whole generation of boys will read it and end up wanting to become soldiers themselves, to re-enact that fantasy on a global stage, and for causes even less clear cut. Well….you guys know the rest of the story; Slaughterhouse Five ended up NOT being that kind of novel (for all the good it did). Kurt and the wife ended up being fast friends. Meanwhile, many other novels, movies, and TV shows DID become precisely what she feared. Which begs the question: Is there really such a thing as an “anti-war” film? At least in American cinema?

[@TheJonnyEnglish]

Thin red line

[@joshuaisbell9174]

The 101st spent like 2 1/2 months in direct combat when other divisions were in it almost constantly, and they haven’t shut the fuck up since then.

[@zainmudassir2964]

Propaganda reasons. The segregated black soldiers are usually written out of WW2 history since they can reveal uncomfortable truths about the 'good guys'

[@parkerhuff9995]

I hate to sound like a ww2 uncle but dick winters taught me a lot about what a good leader looks like. You got to show your peeps that you will take the hard jobs and work alongside the folks you are fortunate enough to work with.

[@Eamonshort1]

For real I'm as anti war as one can get. But, I'd pick up a riffle and follow Winter's into hell without a second thought. My best friend Adam reminds me so much of Winter's, and I tell him that's one of the greatest comparisons one can draw.

[@gregwillson7952]

Leadership means being just as cold and scared and lonely as everyone else, but not being allowed to show it, because they need someone to inspire them.

[@twistedoperator4422]

Yeah we all had shit dads.

[@FoulWeatherFriend385]

What’s always bothered me about Band of Brothers is that as the years progressed, more & more glaring historical inaccuracies came out regarding the portrayal of certain characters. They claimed that Blythe was dead when he wasn’t and also slandered Dyke’s name by branding him an incompetent coward when in reality he saved multiple soldiers under fire and was disabled by a shot to the arm during the attack in Foy. He didn’t just freeze like the show says. HBO has never made any effort to correct these mistakes, and from what I’ve read, the surviving members of East company seemed fine with continuing to lie about it. That is, the “accepted” members of East company. There are certain members who didn’t worship Winters (I.e. Shames) and they were also portrayed negatively in the series. So what’s true and what isn’t?

[@lachlank.8270]

Based on an Actual Band of Brothers™️

[@tonywords6713]

The best postmodern piece of media about WW2 is the Master Call of Duty World at War is actually very good. Definitely the anti to Medal of Honor

[@HandyDandy6]

The first time I watched band of brothers I was sitting in the loading room to do my first jump in Airborne school. They played it on a projector and we watched a few episodes while we waited. I don't think I've ever bought into it more than that moment.

[@Ratking_420]

That shit pumped me up so hard. Also that ridiculous 70s airborne ad that they played too.

[@Eamonshort1]

Whilst The Pacific is definitely not as good i really dont think you can say "it doesnt try as much".

[@mekskraptrakkz5718]

I definitely think it wasn't trying to be the same thing.

[@Eamonshort1]

@@mekskraptrakkz5718 oh sorry, yes you're right there. I thought they meant it as in it was a low effort show.

[@garcalej]

It was definitely more depressing. In BoB one at least got a sense of purpose and mission, in spite of all the death and stupidity surrounding them, however romanticized or retroactively sanctified the reasons for fighting were. The Pacific, they couldn't even put a fig leaf on that; it was just one long, mosquito ridden slog across the Antipodean wilderness, one shitty island after another, each more miserable than the last, all for the purpose of avenging the dishonor done by one empire to another. And to what end? Revenge? Validation? The dubious prize of owning a bit more real estate in Asia and then getting dragged into even more wars because of it? Poor bastards couldn't even stop hentai from happening. Think on that next time your visiting the WW2 monument in DC: they dragged their raggedy asses up that volcanic slope, getting shot at all the way, and planted a flag. And Host Club still happened.

[@alexhawksteel6]

I literally looked up if they reviewed this show yesterday, talk about timing.

[@drdrai7479]

49:00 Matt and his squibs lmao

[@supermarx]

The future of war movies is probably 40k... imagine what that's gonna do to motherfuckers.

[@samz1950]

2:15

[@forbiddenfruit1558]

Fixed!

[@TheLetsRead]

@@forbiddenfruit1558mensch 🙏

[@williammalin7909]

First

[@zainmudassir2964]

Band of aunties

[@ethantaylor9613]

What the fuck does he mean by we’re not a country with history? I guess he’s making a point about how Americans don’t really appreciate history so much on average? Still a very reductive thing to say.

[@BigHomieGayAss1917]

What’s your favorite bit of American history pre-1500 A.D. that doesn’t default to what the native peoples before us were doing here? If you have a hard time answering this question then maybe that says something about just how recent the American project really is.

[@ethantaylor9613]

@@BigHomieGayAss1917 do things only become history if a certain amount of time has passed? I’m pretty sure yesterday was history.

[@BigHomieGayAss1917]

@@ethantaylor9613What is yesterday compared to 5,000 years of contiguous Egyptian history, for example? Or the over 30,000 years of indigenous history in the Americas?

[@ethantaylor9613]

@@BigHomieGayAss1917 thank God that the history committee run by the CEO himself Jon history set forth that the more years of history something has the more gooder it is. So glad there’s a universally excepted standard for these things.

[@dzhang4459]

@@BigHomieGayAss1917 What is human history compared to the 500 million year history of multi-cellular life?

[@zainmudassir2964]

Hope there is show like Band of Brothers with Russian soldiers fighting the Ukrainian fascists being supported by NATO

[@BigHomieGayAss1917]

Soyfacing imagining which Slavic country run by a kleptocratic oligarchy is going to win out. Let’s see, will it be the shitty one supported by NATO or the slightly shittier one not supported by NATO? Only time will tell.

[@dzhang4459]

There is. It's called "Three Guys, One Hammer." I think there was only one episode though.

[@czechmeoutbabe1997]

Ngl, I haven't finished this episode but I think the boys were too interested in being cynical about NATO/Spielberg to actually criticise the show coherently - like the holocaust episode for example. I think that episode is incredible, not because it shows America being awesome, but because it shows the lived reality of the soldiers discovering the Holocaust in a way that made it feel genuinely shocking, and like it was being discovered looking forwards into time. A lot of WW2 media portrays the Nazis as Nazis from the outset of the war, as if everyone knew that the Holocaust was going on and judged them morally that way from the start. No, unfortunately for a lot of people, this was just "another war against the Germans" until the camps started getting discovered. Also, Spielberg is an ideologue, but I think he's much more subtle in Saving Private Ryan, where he for example genuinely does depict the Americans committing atrocities, and shows his idealogical ass so much more in his later, more stupid movies, like Bridge of Spies or The Terminal or The Post.

[@TheLetsRead]

I think the US turning away Jewish refugees from the Reich and its war of conquest is a factor you’re not addressing with the emphasis it deserves in your characterization of the US and its relationship to the genocide. Perhaps the accuracy of the immediate GI experience of finding these camps is accurate, I can’t speak to that, but we’re living in a post-Zone of Interest mass media environment. Mentioning this in good faith bc your comment reads as giving pre-war America (or at least its government & its factions) the benefit of the doubt it does not deserve, despite contributing to the war effort which incapacitated the active genocides the German and Japanese governments perpetrated through their bloody imperialism.