The Pacific: Season 1

METASCORE

Universal acclaim based on 32 Critic Reviews

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USER SCORE

Generally favorable reviews based on 239 Ratings

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7.7

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7.7	Your Score
7.7	User Score Generally favorable reviews based on 239 Ratings

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The Pacific

Now Playing: The Pacific

Season Details & Credits

HBO | Season Premiere Date: March 14, 2010

Starring: Jon Seda, James Badge Dale, Rami Malek

Summary: Three marines are the protagonists in Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg's miniseries about the war in the Pacific that begins after the attack on Pearl Harbor.

Genre(s): Drama, Action & Adventure, Suspense, Documentary

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Season 1 Episodes

tbd
S1:E10. Home
Air Date: May 16, 2010
tbd
S1:E9. Okinawa
Air Date: May 9, 2010
tbd
S1:E8. Iwo Jima
Air Date: May 2, 2010

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Metascore

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Critic Reviews

100

James Poniewozik

It will repay you with a brutal but eloquent story that's finally less about how men fight and die than what happens to them when they fight and survive. It will show you how character and sheer, unfair randomness combine to produce cruelty or decency. And it will make you feel deeply for the men who return. Read full review

100

Hal Boedeker

The Pacific balances the visceral virtuosity of its war sequences with poignant, stirring portraits. Once you sign on, you have to see what happened to these men--the sign of expert storytelling. An epilogue supplies crucial updates. Read full review

100

Maureen Ryan

Certain moments may verge on cliche (and once in a while, the dialogue is a little corny), but overall, The Pacific is crafted and acted with such loving devotion that it's hard to find fault with its sincerity and sentimental forays. Read full review

David Hinckley

This 10-hour production on World War II in the Pacific is an ambitious, imperfect, intense and often compelling look at combat that gets dirtier and more ragged with each episode. Read full review

Ken Tucker

The Pacific has both grand scale and intimacy. It builds in intensity as the series proceeds. Read full review

Ellen Gray

Obvious or not, I watched most of the 10 episodes without the scene-setters and was occasionally lost. But if the battles aren't always distinctive, the characters are. Read full review

Cynthia Fuchs

In its insistence on the chaos of battles and the confusion of downtime, the series also offers another “harsh reality,” that these decent men are exploited by their faceless government, again and again. If this story is not explicit in the bloody surface of The Pacific, it is a persistent, distressing undercurrent. Read full review

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User Score

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7.7

User Reviews

Brosman

May 29, 2013

When this show first got announced, I knew Band of Brothers would be something very tough to surpass. Although the Pacific isn't better than BoB its is still an incredible movie/show to watch. On its own accord this film is great and is easily one of my favorite movie/shows of all time.

3 of 4 users found this helpful31

hdosorio

Apr 19, 2011

Hemos visto muchas series y pelÃculas de la segunda guerra mundial enfocadas en los eventos desarrollados en Europa, esta serie nos trae una imagen sorprendente y veraz de lo sucedido en el PacÃfico entre Estados Unidos y Japon. Buen guÃon, buenasHemos visto muchas series y pelÃculas de la segunda guerra mundial enfocadas en los eventos desarrollados en Europa, esta serie nos trae una imagen sorprendente y veraz de lo sucedido en el PacÃfico entre Estados Unidos y Japon. Buen guÃon, buenas actuaciones, espectacular montaje, vale la pena. Un buen complemento a esta serie es ver la pelÃcula Letters from Iwo Jima… Expand

1 of 1 users found this helpful10

russiangamer

May 10, 2017

Менее душевный, чем "Братья по оружию", но более захватывающий, в том смысле, что держит у экрана, с чем иногда не справлялись те же "Братья", которые не смотря на это, остаются прекрасным сериалом.
Актёры, техническая сторона, музыка - всё прекрасно, но сценарий имеет реально смешные шуткиМенее душевный, чем "Братья по оружию", но более захватывающий, в том смысле, что держит у экрана, с чем иногда не справлялись те же "Братья", которые не смотря на это, остаются прекрасным сериалом.
Актёры, техническая сторона, музыка - всё прекрасно, но сценарий имеет реально смешные шутки и их много! В "Братьях" шутки, естественно, были, но тут смеялся от души, что способствовало погружению. Не говорю, что сериал теперь комедия, нет. Это по-прежнему отличная драма о тяготах войны, которую я советую к просмотру!… Expand

1 of 1 users found this helpful10

Cinemassacre94

Mar 20, 2016

If you watched the ten brutal episodes of HBO’s Band of Brothers–in which war was not glorious but miserable, and death sudden and ignominious–you were probably not thinking that there was an even uglier side to World War II that this miniseries was not showing you. But there was, andIf you watched the ten brutal episodes of HBO’s Band of Brothers–in which war was not glorious but miserable, and death sudden and ignominious–you were probably not thinking that there was an even uglier side to World War II that this miniseries was not showing you. But there was, and showing that side is the project of The Pacific, the ten-episode bookend that in nearly every way improves on its 2001 European-theater predecessor.

The war against Japan was different from the war against Hitler militarily, topographically and psychologically. WWII in Europe was, for all its mechanized death and horror, in some ways a throwback: it was the last great (so far) land war in Europe, fought in places with recognizable names by great massed armies. The men fighting there may have not known the big picture or cared about the geopolitics, but they at least recognized the war.

(As did we. For whatever reason, the movies have had more success with war-in-Europe stories than with war-in-the-Pacific stories like Letters from Iwo Jima and The Thin Red Line. Even WWII videogames, like Call of Duty, involve Nazi-fighting more often than Pacific-war scenarios.)

In the other theater, The Pacific makes painfully clear in its early episodes, the Marines that it follows had no idea what they were getting into. On the one hand, the war was simple: Japan attacked the U.S. at Pearl Harbor, and now we were going to get those bastards back. On the other hand, they were going to be introduced to a kind of war they had scarcely imagined, on islands they didn’t know, at a cost they could not conceive. “I might have jumped into Normandy, but at least I got some liberties in London and Paris,” a Europe vet tells a Marine after the war. “You got nothing but jungle rot and malaria.”

The Pacific’s Marines are not naive: they know they’re going off to face a fierce enemy. But they go into the war in December 1941 talking about being home by next Christmas. Some expect a “cakewalk.” No one can pronounce “Guadalcanal.” We can, and the reason we know it is how horrible it—and Iwo Jima, and Okinawa, and Peleliu—became for them.

If Band of Brothers’ soldiers were fighting the last kind of war, in many ways The Pacific’s are going to fight the next one. They land on their first beach in a flotilla of armored ships, and we, like them, are dreading the kind of D-Day firefight we saw in Band, and before that in Saving Private Ryan. They land: quiet. For the moment.

Instead of tank columns and shelled European cities, they find oppressive heat, disease and an enemy using guerilla tactics, suicide missions and sometimes civilians. There are poisoned wells and bugs in the rice (“Think of it as meat”). It’s part Vietnam, part Iraq, part horror movie. (In some of the most tense scenes of waiting, in the jungle, in the dark, it is–and I don’t mean this to be glib–like the sense of menace in a scene from Lost.)

But there’s little History Channel-like attention to the sweep and strategy of the war; really, The Pacfic is not about “war” as practiced by generals, but fighting as done by grunts. And unlike Band of Brothers, which spread its attention among a wide ensemble fighting together, The Pacific focuses mainly on three Marines, in different units, whose stories and battles are mostly separate.

Robert Leckie (James Badge Dale) is a smart, cocky aspiring writer who struggles to keep his body and mind intact through some of the war’s fiercest fighting; Dale nails the role, making Leckie a soulful rogue. John Basilone (Jon Seda) is a Medal of Honor winner whose heroism wins him a trip home to sell war bonds—a prize, and a role, he’s uncomfortable with. And Joe Mazzello has maybe the most psychologically tricky role: Eugene Sledge, who has a guaranteed out from fighting—a heart murmur—and enlists anyway, over the objections of his father, who worries he’ll come back dead-eyed and broken like men he’s seen from WWI.

The deeper Sledge gets into the war, the more he sees that his father may have been right. This is a kind of war that tries soldiers’ souls, and minds. Threats seem to be everywhere. Rumors fly (the Japanese have poisoned the coconuts, goes one). Witnessing atrocities and an almost incomprehensible willingness of the enemy to die takes a toll, and brings out ugliness in some soldiers along with the best in others. There are acts of bravery and self-sacrifice, as well as casual racism toward the “yellow monkeys.” After one savage battle, a few Marines amuse themselves by taking potshots at a stranded enemy soldier, to kill him slowly; disgusted, Leckie dispatches the soldier with his sidearm to end it.

But if you want to watch The Pacific, it will repay you with a brutal but eloquent story that’s finally less about how men fight and die than what happens to them when they fight and survive. It will show you how character and sheer, unfair randomness combine to produce cruelty or decency.… Expand

0 of 0 users found this helpful00

MorbidPig

Aug 19, 2014

Less ambitious than Band of Brothers, but a whole lot darker, The Pacific is both a tragic and important reminder of the individuals caught between an international armed conflict and the home they yearn to see again.

1 of 1 users found this helpful10

KundK

Aug 28, 2010

Technically perfect, but more disjointed and much less engaging than the fantastic Band of Brothers. I could not make myself care for any of the characters and that kills everything, even the will to finish watching the last two episodes. It seems the story would function better if theyTechnically perfect, but more disjointed and much less engaging than the fantastic Band of Brothers. I could not make myself care for any of the characters and that kills everything, even the will to finish watching the last two episodes. It seems the story would function better if they ditched the idea of following the books and made a cast of composite characters (still true) who would be with us all the way.… Expand

0 of 1 users found this helpful01

recon292

Jan 8, 2013

Bad acting, great special effects, and the story of the Marines in the Pacific Theater could be told by 5th graders and still be fascinating. However, and for whatever reason, the director decided to make the characters so cliche and the writers went waaay out of their way to try to excludeBad acting, great special effects, and the story of the Marines in the Pacific Theater could be told by 5th graders and still be fascinating. However, and for whatever reason, the director decided to make the characters so cliche and the writers went waaay out of their way to try to exclude or minimize everything Army, and if that wasn't good enough, decided they needed to throw in a few poorly written jabs as well. Obviously done in poor taste and there's not enough story to hold the narrative together as the characters get lost in the jumble and then sweeping boring lulls. Skip this one, stick to Band of Brothers.… Expand

5 of 7 users found this helpful52

SEE ALL 33 REVIEWS

Seasons & Episodes

86

Series Overview
Season 1

86
- Season 1 Overview
  Air Date: March 14, 2010
- tbd
  S1:E10. Home
  Air Date: May 16, 2010
- tbd
  S1:E9. Okinawa
  Air Date: May 9, 2010
- tbd
  S1:E8. Iwo Jima
  Air Date: May 2, 2010
- tbd
  S1:E7. Peleliu Hills
  Air Date: April 25, 2010
- tbd
  S1:E6. Peleliu Airfield
  Air Date: April 18, 2010
- tbd
  S1:E5. Peleliu Landing
  Air Date: April 11, 2010
- tbd
  S1:E4. Gloucester/Pavuvu/Banika
  Air Date: April 4, 2010
- tbd
  S1:E3. Melbourne
  Air Date: March 28, 2010
- tbd
  S1:E2. Basilone
  Air Date: March 21, 2010
- tbd
  S1:E1. Guadalcanal/Leckie
  Air Date: March 14, 2010
- tbd
  S1:E0. Making The Pacific
  Air Date: February 13, 2010