Kuwait, 2003: The 1st Recon Battalion of the 1st Marines are preparing to invade Iraq. Evan Wright (Lee Tergesen) arrives to accompany 2nd platoon of Bravo Company during the invasion. The Marines are not exactly keen on having a reporter along but he is soon accepted. Second platoon is commanded by Lt. Nate Fick (Stark Sands), but Wright is assigned to the Humvee commanded by Staff Sergeant Brad "Iceman" Colbert (Alexander Skarsgard). Lt. Col. Stephen "Godfather" Ferrando (Chance Kelly) is a hard charging marine and quite eager to get his men "into the game" with plenty of action. When he has an officer meeting, he invariably tells the men that they aren't being aggressive enough. The narrative follows two aspects of the war. First, there are the various battles, skirmishes, and encounters with the Iraqi fighters and civilians. This is pretty one-sided, as the marines utterly dominate the battles and only have 1 interpreter to converse with non-combatants. Second, there is the esprit-de-corps - or lack of it - of the marines themselves. Questions of competence, issues of morality, second-guessing of tactics, and so forth are frequent topics of discussion. The marines also trade insults and unflattering nicknames. Despite their battlefield dominance, the behind-the-scenes action paints the officer corps as a mixed bag of good officers and incompetent ones. Also, the marines often find they need to scrounge for equipment, be it batteries for their night vision goggles, lubricant for their gun turrets, or even food. The rule is that the marines 'make do.' To demonstrate the 'make do' ethic, one of the marines who lost his helmet finds himself wearing a motorcycle helmet for a while before upgrading to a helmet taken from an Iraqi soldier.
The series primarily follows Team 1 of the 2nd Platoon and is even more focused on the Humvee in which Evan Wright is riding. During the driving scenes, the driver, Corporal Ray Persons (James Ransone), babbles incessantly while Iceman stares out the window at the passing Iraqi landscape. Ray is the standout character who steals many scenes with his humorous banter and frequent singing. In the backseat, Wright occasionally asks a question or - during battles - sits wide-eyed and silent. There is also Lance Corporal Trombley (Billy Lush), who is perhaps too eager to shoot someone.
Despite being a series about war, it was light on action. Sure, lots of things blow up, Iraqis get shot, and bullets ricochet off the vehicles, but it doesn't impact the characters. They are inured to this from their time in Afghanistan and that insouciance makes the action seem more like annoying inclement weather than a dangerous firefight.
This is no Band of Brothers. It offers a narrow glimpse of the Iraq War and a brief biography of a score of marines during a two-month window. Just okay.
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