Someone could probably make an amazing mini series about the Battle of Britain, could cover all aspects of it civilian and military

Watched them back to back yesterday and thought they were fine. Looking forward to the rest.

Was there an incident of friendly fire in the first episode? I can't tell you who it was but it looked like he accidentally shot down the bomber next to them, but it was never mentioned again so I guess not.

Also, anyone else think Buck's line "I'm just saying…" felt out of place in the 1940's?

Overall i think it's good, but nowhere near BoB, which was going to be next to impossible to love up to. it's on the Mt Rushmore of TV series to me.

this may be an unpopular opinion but i think this was poorly cast. Austin Butler just ain't it. He's too pretty and almost uninspiring to watch and i can't get over the fact that him and Callum are supposed to be the brave badasses who inspire their crews to go into the meat grinder and face almost certain death.

Egan is over the top in his "defy authority and drink whiskey" persona and so far comes across and undisciplined and reckless.

I'm in the "good, but far from great" camp.

The first episode of band of brothers was masterful at building suspense of seeing what those guys were training for and conveying the same anticipation to the watcher. I remember at the end of the first episode of band of Brothers, where it shows Winters in the C47 with the door open and the flak in the distance, the anticipation and dread and excitement and unknown ahead was also felt by the watcher. Just throwing us in to the action in episode one of MOTA you just don't get that feeling of "holy **** i have to see what happens next. There's no build up. no suspense.

Have to disagree with the naysayers. Only watched the first episode but it's on point. BoB is on a pedestal for a reason but it isn't perfect, and this one needs more time to see how it develops but I thought that was a really strong start. A series about B-17 crews just isn't going to have the same feel as a series about the 101st, but for what it is attempting to portray, I think it nailed it. The last bit after their first mission was really poignant. Made you feel for those guys getting their first taste of how horrifying those missions were and realizing you had another couple dozen to go....had to have felt like you'd never make it. Can't wait for the rest!

It probably has more to do with the age I watched the shows, but the actors in Masters of the Air seem appropriately young. Butler does seem out of place so far.

Band or Brothers was masterful in many ways, including casting, but they seemed older than the men they were representing.

Stive said:

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Watched the first episode and I have a few questions:

#1: Why were the ground guys telling them all to shut up and get to interrogation after they landed? It was almost like they didn't want them talking about their experience in front of the ground crews?

#2: And does anyone understand the strategy of flying the lead bombers at higher altitudes than the trailing groups? Was that "just the way it was" or was there some key reason that they staggered the planes that way, highest to lowest?

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#1: Immediate interrogation to gain as much information about the mission from crewman memory as possible. You didn't want them talking to other crews because it may convolute their personal memory.

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Trucks took the men to the briefing room, which was now set up for interrogation. Every crew was checked in by an S-2 clerk who verified each man's name and position. Any changes from the original crew load lists were reported on a "Sortie Record" to ensure that everyone got credit for completing the mission. This report also named crews who would not get credit because they aborted.

Aircrews first reported "hot news"-details on convoys, a/c in distress, etc.-that needed to be transmitted right away. Crews were then thoroughly questioned. Using a preprinted Interrogation Form, the debriefing officer noted crew comments about their bombing attack (time, altitude, heading, number of bombs dropped on target or jettisoned, and results, if seen); personnel injuries and plane damage; equipment malfunctions or failures; enemy a/c encounters (including tactics and unusual weapons used); friendly fighter support (time, place and effectiveness); and locations and types of flak encountered.

579th navigator Red Sprowls notes, "It was always very important to know where and when the Group encountered flak since the Germans were using mobile guns mounted on rail cars and they continued to move their guns. We knew that the major cities were well-protected but intelligence always wanted the extent or any changes in the intensity of the flak. This was of course used in plotting the future route in and out of targets. These flak areas were plotted on the lead navigator and Mickey operators' maps and were extremely important if the Group was forced off the plotted course due to weather or error."

After all crews had been questioned, their responses were compiled and Missing Air Crew Reports (MACRs) drafted. Navigators turned in their logs and bombardiers completed bombing reports. Lead crew command pilots, navigators, and bombardiers wrote detailed accounts about what they did and why. If a tactical error had been made (such as bombing the wrong target), the process was especially intense. Finally, crews were released to go to the mess hall or to their barracks. For men who had just returned from a mission and knew they faced many more, sleep was difficult.

Taken from this source (a pretty good breakdown of a full mission for B-24s) ANATOMY OF A BOMBING MISSION

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#2: Planes were staggered to create combat boxes. This way each squadron of planes had overlapping fields of fire to cover each other. If they were all on the same horizontal plane, the gunners would be more likely to his each other. It also allowed the planes to fly semi sorta close together so that when they started dropping bombs, they'd all hit a tighter area of effect. The Americans were determined to do strategic precision bombing, which is another reason why they flew daytime missions.

Training film from that era for waist gunners on how to hit targets

Stive said:

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Watched the first episode and I have a few questions:

Why were the ground guys telling them all to shut up and get to interrogation after they landed? It was almost like they didn't want them talking about their experience in front of the ground crews?

And does anyone understand the strategy of flying the lead bombers at higher altitudes than the trailing groups? Was that "just the way it was" or was there some key reason that they staggered the planes that way, highest to lowest?

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I'm not an expert, but here's my attempt to answer questions:

Ground crews don't have the same clearances as pilots. There is fear that they may talk too much at bars and stuff where German agents are listening. Can't give the Germans and indication on what works and what doesn't.

And on the staggerings, the flak shells were time based. They turn a dial on the head to a certain number of seconds and they detonate that many seconds after firing. So if American planes were all at the same altitude, then it would be easier for the Germans to stay zeroed in. Yet if the planes we each are different attitudes, then there would be a high risk that they would be dropping bombs on each other. So they changed the altitude by group.

Bonus info: us Americans developed a revolutionary shell called the VT fuse.. after every other country tried and failed. It was an incredible piece of engineering. In effect, each shell had a proximity radar on it. It not only detonated the when it was close to the target, but used doppler to take relative velocities into effect. It also had directional blast to ensure timing was ideal. All without digital computers. It was so secret that most people don't know about it today. It was used primarily at sea so that unexploded shells would fall into the sea and out of the hands of the enemy. It was so effective that at the end of the war the Japanese would send hundreds of kamikazes against our ships, and not a single one would get through. Compared to the beginning of the war when the British would shoot thousands of shells against German planes during the battle of Britain and not hit anything. We later used them against ground troops in the battle of the bulge and F-ed Germans up with it. They had no idea how we seemed to never miss.

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It was so effective that at the end of the war the Japanese would send hundreds of kamikazes against our ships, and not a single one would get through.

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The proximity fuse was a great invention, but you are wrong about the effect of kamikazes.

At least 34 American ships were sunk during the war and hundreds damaged by suicide attacks.

Just at Okinawa, 5000 men were killed.

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If a plane is flying higher, and out in front of a lower plane, and starts dropping bombs, then the bombs would be falling into the paths of the lower planes.

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That did sometimes happen if the lower planes were too far forward in the combat box.

OldArmy71 said:

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It was so effective that at the end of the war the Japanese would send hundreds of kamikazes against our ships, and not a single one would get through.

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The proximity fuse was a great invention, but you are wrong about the effect of kamikazes.

At least 34 American ships were sunk during the war and hundreds damaged by suicide attacks.

Just at Okinawa, 5000 men were killed.

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My great uncle was an island hopping Marine. He told a story about being on deck of a troop transport that was attacked by kamikazes. He said he watched a kamikaze get shot down in front of him and the spray from the plane hitting the water, got him in the face. chilling.

The rear planes being lower means that when they drop their bombs , its closer to the same path that the lead bomber dropped their bombs on. The US was daylight bombing trying to drop bombs on specific targets with precision. So every bomber is trying to hit the same target point.

As part of the creation of the "combat box" they also started only putting the bomb sights in the lead bomber where the most experienced, most trained, and best bombardier was located and every other bomber in the formation just hit their button at the same time they saw the lead bomber start dropping, so being a little lower and a little behind, also has the effect of adjusting the drop point for every altitude, I think, but I'm not sure it really mattered to a great degree, and some planes where at higher altitude than the leader I think.

The other planes were issued paper towel tubes to look down

aTmAg said:

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OldArmy71 said:

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It was so effective that at the end of the war the Japanese would send hundreds of kamikazes against our ships, and not a single one would get through.

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The proximity fuse was a great invention, but you are wrong about the effect of kamikazes.

At least 34 American ships were sunk during the war and hundreds damaged by suicide attacks.

Just at Okinawa, 5000 men were killed.

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You have to remember, the US build 9000+ ships during the war. 34 ships is a rounding error.

Secondly, the VT fuse wasn't first used until late in the war, and not widely available until near the end. Where it was deployed, it was extremely effective. For example, in May of 1945, 2 destroyers, that were armed with VT fuses, were targeted by 150 Kamikazes off Okinawa, but not a single one got through.

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Not to the crews of thousands of men killed and wounded.