Band Of Brothers (2001) is now twenty years old. When it first aired on HBO Band Of Brothers epitomized the movement towards the cinematic in American television that had begun with The Sopranos two years prior. When the first episode aired on September ninth viewers were immersed in the world of Easy Company. Band Of Brothers was a more expansive and epic version of producer Steven Spielberg’s much lauded Saving Private Ryan (1998). The events of 9/11 changed the way viewers took in this WWII mini-series. It wasn’t about returning to the action and drama of yesterday’s blockbuster anymore, it had become a focal point for viewers surviving a national trauma.
The stalwart patriotism of Band Of Brothers helped to unify the United States as it scrambled to make sense of and react to the terrorist attacks. The incredibly expensive pet project of Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg had found a new agency. Watching Band Of Brothers in 2001 it was impossible not to see something of the emergency rescue teams at ground zero in characters like Dick Winters (Damian Lewis). Something saccharine and nostalgic had become propaganda over night.
Band Of Brothers no longer carries this significance with it to the same degree. Twenty years later it is just another HBO mini series from the dawn of the second golden age of television. Ironically Band Of Brothers isn’t as good as its reputation suggests. There are a great many voice overs that operate under the assumption that the viewer is unaware of the cliches in war movies or that the viewer really has no idea what it is they are seeing when they look at the screen. It’s some of the worst screenwriting I’ve seen in a prestige cable program. Luckily this poor writing is slightly compensated for with the use of documentary interviews in the same format as Warren Beatty’s Reds (1981). What’s most enjoyable about Band Of Brothers in 2021 is seeing just how young Damian Lewis, Michael Fassbender, James McAvoy, Tom Hardy, and so many other stars were. David Schwimmer is particularly good and smarmy in the same way that he excelled in The People vs. O.J. Simpson (2016).
There really isn’t a Band Of Brothers for our COVID-19 world. There’s no show for the nation to rally behind one night a week and keep us unified for the following six days. The nature of a war film keeps it from being that applicable to the circumstances of a pandemic. With the political schisms in America right now the patriotic posturing and sentimentality of Band Of Brothers would also likely be polarizing. It would have been nice though to have a Band Of Brothers for 2020.
