>>216001280How was the first episode?
>>216001500Its good. If you like Ken Burns docs you'll like it.
>>216001500Very well done. Josh Brolin voices Washington and he's gonna be fun. Loved the music. Slightly Blade Runner-esque in spots. Peter Coyote narrates wonderfully.
This episode was really heavy about the blacks. And omg Washington owned slaves!
>>216002793Civil War had it too, and it's so heavy handed we'd probably call it woke these days. But back when it was released the fatigue hadn't set in yet.
>>216002793thats all I need to hear
It did nothing to assuage the reservations I had after last night’s episode. More demonizing of the colonists and heavy-handed lecturing trying to tear down Washington for existing as white man behaving as one normally would. The only respite was when, of all people, the black lady surprisingly gave Jefferson his credit when he’s usually the one who has most of the, “But muh slavery was bad,” shit filling at him. The descriptions of Bunker Hill and Quebec were also lacking compared to the YouTube doc I mentioned yesterday, though they did go into slightly more detail about the role of navies, Washington organizing the Continental Army, and the Noble Train of Artillery, which, perplexingly, they never actually refer to by name. If the trend continues, I’m probably going to give up on it. I’ve been generally disappointed so far.
>>216004464*flung, not filling
Typical PBS slop
>>216004464They should go into how Washington had a self-serving obsession with dishonest land speculation and his federal government amounted to an elaborate real estate scheme that descended into near anarchy and civil war before he even left office
>>216003306Yup.
>>216005215>a self-serving obsession with dishonest land speculationAmerica has not really changed in this regard, at least.
Hilarious seeing how this doc makes the usual demographic of /tv/ squirm so much when they're the first ones to go on about "the foundational myth" and "the narrative" of World War 2
>>216001280>Sarah Botstein Uh oh
>>216005215It was mentioned in the first episode.
>>216004464Haven't watched ep 2 yet, but if they get around to talking about Sally Hemings I think it would be an interesting test of bias vs intellectual honesty.Havening looked into it a bit more, the official narrative of evil Thomas Jefferson raped a poor innocent underage black slave, and even fathered multiple children with her, isn't as solid as the mainstream belief holds it is, now. Though it's funny because the more complex story is even weirder than the orthodoxy (Sally was actually his dead wife's, half, younger sister and supposedly looked like her). I would even go as far, personally, to say I think he didn't have a relationship with her at all.
>>216005419>>216006239I went on a deep dive of Washington research last year. He’s really not someone you walk away liking or respecting. Even his contemporaries, Adams, Jefferson, Hamilton, other generals like Charles Lee, I don’t get the impression they respected him. He kind of reminds me of Barry Lyndon in that he’s dull and selfish in a quintessential way of that era. I really wonder if we would’ve been better off in the long run with someone like Samuel Adams as the first president instead.
>>216006822Also early American history was just failure after failure. The Articles of Confederation government fails miserably, Washington’s administration descends into a nasty precursor to the civil war. We get embarrassed in 1812. Our two most successful eras (late 1800s, mid 1900s) come after the feds claim dictatorial wartime powers over the economy. At what point do we admit our “experiment in democracy” “spirit of 76”was a mistake all along. We proved why the Roman republic failed, a totally self-interested elite with senatorial powers can’t rule that vast of a territory.
>>216001500White soldiers badEveryone else goodPar for the course for Ken desu
