From Steven Spielberg, Tom Hanks, and Gary Goetzman - the producers of Band of Brothers and The Pacific. During World War II, airmen risk their lives with the 100th Bomb Group, a brotherhood forged by courage, loss, and triumph. Based on Donald L. Miller’s book of the same name, and scripted by John Orloff, “Masters of the Air” follows the men of the 100th Bomb Group (the “Bloody Hundredth”) as they conduct perilous bombing raids over Nazi Germany and grapple with the frigid conditions, lack of oxygen, and sheer terror of combat conducted at 25,000 feet in the air. Portraying the psychological and emotional price paid by these young men as they helped destroy the horror of Hitler’s Third Reich, is at the heart of “Masters of the Air.” Some were shot down and captured; some were wounded or killed. And some were lucky enough to make it home. Regardless of individual fate, a toll was exacted on them all. The series features a stellar cast led by Academy Award nominee Austin Butler, Callum Turner, Anthony Boyle and Nate Mann, who are joined by Raff Law, Academy Award nominee Barry Keoghan, Josiah Cross, Branden Cook and Ncuti Gatwa. Hailing from Apple Studios, "Masters of the Air" is executive produced by Steven Spielberg through Amblin Television, and Tom Hanks and Gary Goetzman for Playtone. Amblin Television’s Darryl Frank and Justin Falvey co-executive produce alongside Playtone’s Steven Shareshian. In addition to writing, Orloff co-executive produces. Graham Yost also serves as co-executive producer. Anna Boden, Ryan Fleck, Cary Joji Fukunaga, Dee Rees and Tim Van Patten serve as directors.
Thanks for the info. I'll be looking for this when it is released. Playtone also produced the WWII movie Greyhound. I've been waiting for the announced Greyhound sequel as well.
Finally! I've been waiting years for this. I can't wait to watch this alongside Band of Brothers and The Pacific. I was pleasantly surprised by the presence of Ncuti Gatwa and a P-51 with a certain distinctive tail coloring. Looks like we're going to get at least a bit of the Tuskegee Airmen in this, too. Excellent.
Fantastic! I've been waiting for this one for years. I still can't believe it's taken this long to come out and I'm still surprised HBO passed on it. The trailer feels pretty ambitious and I feel like it will be well worth the long wait. I knew the cast wasn't going to be full of big names like the last the two, but somehow I still managed to miss that Ncuti Gatwa was going to be in it. Feels like he's everywhere now and his star is about to explode. I really hope this miniseries is a big hit for Apple+ because I'm dying for this team to finally do one for the Navy! C'mon y'all, us Navy needs some love!
I'm an Air Force brat, so this is the show I've been waiting for. But it does seem like now that they've covered this story, they really should complete the set with a Navy miniseries. I'm not sure what would be the best way to go with that, though. How would you want to see them do a show about the Navy's contribution to the war effort?
The most we have gotten so far for the Navy from Apple+ is the movie Greyhound, and it has an as yet to be scheduled sequel. I would like to see a Navy miniseries that takes place in the Pacific. Even one in the Atlantic where the focus would be on the valiant merchant sailors were still going to sea, and Admiral King didn't have enough Navy ships to protect them, and refused to accept the UK's offer of assistance, during Germany's Operation Drumbeat.
The Pacific Theater would be a good way to go and cover such battles as Midway and Coral Sea. Probably a few others I'm blanking on (somewhere, somewhen, an RDC is yelling at me for forgetting my Navy history...). I would say Guadalcanal but that was already covered by The Pacific, albeit only the Marines side of it.
That's a hard one because so much went on with the Navy at so many different times and places. Also, there were so many facets to the war that it's hard to concentrate on just one. Naval aviation played a huge role, but it is less well known that the submarine service is largely credited with winning the war in the Pacific through the slow logistical strangulation of Japan. At Leyte Gulf, there was even a final hurrah for the battleships in a classic battle line 'crossing of the T' at Surigao Strait during the battle. The Battle off Samar would require an entire episode to tell. (Also part of Leyte Gulf) You've got '40 knot Burke' and his destroyer battles, the saga of the PT boats in the Philipines, the U-boat fight in the Atlantic... there's a lot. Samuel Eliot Morrison's History of U.S. Naval Operations in WWII is 14 volumes. That's a lot of history. I guess if I were Hanks, I'd take a multi-prong approach like with The Pacific. First thread is the PACFLT command staff, starting early with Husband Kimmel and then the tenure of Chester Nimitz. That keeps the 'big picture' coherent for the audience. For the action, pick one command, probably the USS Enterprise CV-6, and follow it from Pearl Harbor through the end of the war. She was the most decorated ship of the war and served in most of the major campaigns in the Pacific. Final thread: the submarine war. It would be flat out criminal to leave it out. The problem is that there is so much to cover, if you want to do it comprehensively like the other series. The naval battle of Guadalcanal alone could be its own miniseries, as could Midway, and Leyte Gulf. Packing all of it into ten episodes would be damn near impossible. Unless they wanted to go with an anthology, more of a documentary style, and devote one episode to various topics without following the dramatic story of a set cast of characters. Sort of like From the Earth to the Moon. Anyway. I'd love to see it!
Side note: I saw Greyhound and thought it was a terrible movie. Hanks really fell flat on this one. It needed some characterization and story to give it some heart. It was essentially the second act of a movie without the remainder.
If they do a Navy show, it might be best to put the focus on a couple of fictional composite characters, maybe guys who went to Annapolis together, and then follow their stories through different parts of the war like how Jedi Marso described.
I agree, they could have done some more back story on the rest of the crew. Some of the enlisted and the XO/Navigator, before they set sail on their first convoy.
I have been on a kick of watching older and/or cult movies and TV lately and have found streaming to be a bust in a lot of cases. As time goes on I suppose there's less and less demand and some programs maybe aren't worth the trouble of keeping around?
Free services have the best selection of older shows/movie. Tubi, Pluto, Gem in Canada. Still not a ton of them. Only ones willing to pay for the rights I guess, picking up the scraps left by the big streamers.
I use justwatch.com to see what services are streaming what but a lot of stuff isn't currently streaming on any service and a number of them aren't even available for digital purchase.
This is terribly explained but I hope it makes sense I find justwatch decent for listing what is newly added (although still wrong sometimes, programs listed days early, days late, missed, similar titles pulling up the wrong movie) but when I search for specific programs it seems to often list stuff as unavailable anywhere when it is. Like, if it says something is on Netflix, it likely is, but if it says it's not available anywhere, I do sometimes find it on a streaming service.
hmm, interesting, I've noticed that happen a couple of times on some of the library apps such as hoopla and kanopy that are covered but I'll keep that in mind for when it says something is unavailable to check more services
Oh Hoopla and Kanopy are 100% wrong for me in Canada. Not even close. I don't even check JustWatch for them anymore. I wonder if there are Library consortium exclusives and the justwatch is just a different consortium than mine.