The First World War - The Complete Series

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Editorial Reviews:

Description
This definitive ten-part series offers insight and analysis to provide a coherent and strategic military narrative of the worldwide conflict that changed history.

Customer Reviews: Read 58 more reviews...

5 out of 5 stars

Newest and best series on the First World War August 31, 2005
240 out of 244 found this review helpful

This series is to the First World War what the classic World at War series was to the Second World War. It is shorter but excellent nonetheless.

Although the First World War gets less attention than its successor, it was really the watershed event of the 20th century. This conflict shaped the world that came after to this day. It was the catalyst for the rise of soviet communism in Russia, whose unravelling less than a decade and a half ago continues to affect worldwide diplomacy and economics. Germany's defeat provided the opportunity for fascism and Hitler to come to power there, causing the Second World War and its greater destruction. The defeat of the Ottoman Empire during the First World War and the diplomatic and political morass that followed was the precursor for the reconstitution of Israel and eventually brought the Middle East into center stage today.

This series is based upon the books and encyclopedic knowledge of Professor Hugh Strachan. It examines every aspect of the war, from its causes to the conduct of the war on and behind the front lines to its aftermath. In doing so, it covers the diplomatic, political, military and social aspects, each of which played a role in shaping what happened and why. It does not just present the summary facts but goes in depth in its explanations. For example, instead of simply depicting the spring 1918 German offensive on the western front, it gives detail about how they accomplished it, the attitudes of the troops on each side and the thought processes of the respective high commands.

Not having seen Kenneth Branagh's World War 1 in Color, this reviewer is incompetant to compare the two. However, because this series is thorough and draws upon the professor who may well be THE authority on this era of history, it is likely the best presentation on the subject available today.

5 out of 5 stars

The Best of the First. September 23, 2005
105 out of 108 found this review helpful

"The First World War-The Complete Series" is a marvelous introduction to the world we now live in. Arranged in ten parts and based on historian Hugh Strachan's insightful observations, this eight hour plus look into the "War To End All Wars" is always engaging and amazingly contemporary. Mixing film elements of the period with contemporary footage, this four disc program offers insightful explanations into such controversial topics as Jihad and the troubled Middle East, Ireland, Africa, the rise of the nation state, and the rise of the United States to name but a few. What "The World At War" is to World War Two, "The First World War-The Complete Series" is to its predecessor; simply the best documentary on the subject I've yet seen.

5 out of 5 stars

Best in its Class... May 15, 2006
64 out of 64 found this review helpful

I cannot praise this series enough. Remarkably complete and ultimately absorbing, this series does for WWI what "World At War" (1973) did for WWII. Every installment is a fascinating, up-close and comprehensive examination of the often complex elements and participants fighting in the world's first truly "modern war."

Special attention is paid to specific details that most other series leave out; for example, the role of the Ottoman Turks, the significant naval battles between Germany and Great Britain, the battles in the Middle East, and the contributions of the British Commonwealth soldiers from across the Empire. It makes the old CBS series narrated by Robert Ryan a mere footnote and PBS's politically-correct "The Great War" resemble something of a mere amateur documentary filmmaker. Much of the unseen footage secured by Channel 4 in making the documentary was recently discovered from archives in Central and Eastern Europe. The series also takes a close-up look of the weaponry and the letters/diary entries of soldiers from both sides.

Can a excellent documentary compel you to read more on the subject? Well, this one certainly can. This series makes WWI a most fascinating subject worthy of further study and analysis. Too often, what has been mistakenly taught in school is that WWI was merely a "dress rehersal" for the rise of fascism and WWII. This series proves otherwise and we need more first-class documentary series like this. Kudos to Johnathan Lewis and Channel 4 for putting together such a superb series. I liked the series so much, I purchased the Hew Strachan book the series is based on! A real gem....

3 out of 5 stars

Wide breadth of coverage, but hardly comprehensive. March 13, 2007
22 out of 27 found this review helpful

This DVD series has its moments. There is an excellent beginning that describes the fragile state of the Austro-Hungarian empire and the alliances and ambitions of the European nations that would inexorably drive the world to war as the result of the assassination of the Archduke Ferdinand.

There are also other excellent pieces, among them: the adventures of Admiral Graf Spee and the several German surface ships that had avoided being bottled up in their home ports, the South African conflict, the Arabs and Lawrence of Arabia, and an explanation of the Armenian massacre.

The intent of this series seems to be to focus on those events of WWI that have relevance to the conflicts and controversies of today. So we see how the British cruelly preyed upon rising Arab nationalism to pry away most of the Middle East away from the Ottoman Empire. We see how Japan was asked by Britain to attack German interests in China, thus giving it a foothold and a beginning to its later full-scale invasion of China (which would eventually engulf the U.S. at Pearl Harbor). We see how the futile efforts of the British to track down a wily German adversary in southern Africa ended up devastating large swaths of African native villages. We see how the modern day conflicts of Serbia, Croatia, and Bosnia had their starts in the breakup of the Austro-Hungarian empire. We see how Lenin and the Bolsheviks got started with the Russian Revolution with help from the Germans.

All of this is just grand. But what get lost are the usual centerpiece stories of WWI - there are only the briefest mentions of major battles such as the Somme, Ypres, Paschendale, barely any mention at all of the dawn of aviation warfare in WWI, only a passing reference to the presence of American soldiers in WWI (portrayed only as obstinately independent and grossly over-eager to repeat all the same mistakes of the British and French forces).

Many of the same shots of battle footage get repeated over and over again. This obviously makes you wonder just exactly which battles these scenes really came from, and severely discredits the whole series.

The old footage also gets interspersed with scenes from modern times. Presumably these modern scenes are of the battlegrounds being described by the narrator, but frequently there is no commentary at all to explain the significance of these modern scenes. A farm field! Great! Another farm field! A forest! Just what the heck are we looking at, I wanted to ask, many times?

All in all, a mediocre series that could have been so much better.

5 out of 5 stars

excellent introduction December 28, 2005
21 out of 21 found this review helpful

I've read a lot about WWII, and have a decent understanding of period in history. Yet I can't say the same thing about WWI, which has never been that accessible to me. I am familiar with some of the campaigns (for example, from reading Alan Moorehead's excellent Gallipoli), but my attempts to slog through some of the longer, more comprehensive histories (such as Hew Strachan's 1200-page To Arms) left me swimming in details but not understanding the "big picture" of the war.

Until I watched The First World War. It's a fantastic introduction to the war-why it was fought, how it was fought, and why it mattered, and still matters today. Everything makes a lot more sense to me now, and I feel like I can dig deeper into specific areas of interest. So, if you're like me-frustrated in your attempts to understand a pivotal event in 20th-century history--spend eight hours watching this DVD. You won't be sorry.

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