Fact, Fantasy or Fiction ?
Posted by Big John on May 23, 2011
When it comes to TV entertainment I do enjoy a good ‘historical’ drama series, and sometimes for the wrong reasons as with .. ‘The Tudors’ .. which featured a bloke who looked nothing like Henry VIII, and was a bit light on historical fact to say the least.
One series which I quite enjoyed was .. ‘John Adams’ .. and more recently .. ‘The Kennedys’.. even though it was a bit ‘messy’, and for some reason, a major character was missing from the story. Perhaps they are going to make a mini-series all about Teddy as a follow up ?
I did watch the first series of .. ‘Spartacus’.. but by the second episode of the prequel I had as much blood, guts, swearing and Roman ‘rumpy-pumpy’ as I could stand; and decided to reach for the remote just as John Hannah lifted his tunic and sat down for a crap in a public loo. A scene that was probably accurate in historical detail, but not what I want to see when half way through my pepperoni pizza !
I thought that the HBO mini-series .. ‘The Pacific’.. was outstanding. A true story about real men in a very real war.
Not so realistic (although I’m sure many think it true) is the latest “epic saga” .. ‘Game of Thrones’ .. with Sean Bean playing .. Well .. Eh! .. Sean Bean and, stealing the show, a great little actor .. Peter Dinklage.
OK, so it’s fantasy and not fact, but it does have a sort of ’Macbeth’ feel to it, and lots of men in armour hacking away at each other: but I must confess that I am struggling with the plot, and as for the characters, I’m afraid that I don’t know my Lanisters from my Targaryens, and I have yet to learn a single word of Dothraki, or understand why they have such bloody long winters.
‘I Claudius’ it ain’t, but it will do until the Teddy Kennedy story comes along. I wonder what they will call it ? I suppose they could borrow the name of that great British war movie and call it …
… ‘A Bridge too Far’ ! 
Betty said
“A Bridge Too Far”. Very funny. I have long been fascinated with the Kennedys, just as I have been fascinated with the Royals. I suppose you could say the Kennedys were our version of royalty. I didn’t watch “The Tudors”, and I can’t figure out why I wasn’t interested. But, The Pacific was great, I thought.
Dick Klade said
Alternate title? Bridge Over Troubled Waters. As last lines go, yours are among the best ever.
Ginnie said
Well, I see where your first two commentors enjoyed the allusion to the bridge but I’d give a lot to have Teddy back in Congress. He spent a lifetime making up for that horrendous happening and was one of the few in Congress who really cared about US …the middle class. At least he lived long enough to see a Democratic President again.