Masters of the Air: Episode Discussion 5

[muccamukk]

In which we (hopefully) welcome directors Anna Boden & Ryan Fleck!

Rules:

1. Don't be a dick. Specifically (but not limited to):


1. Not liking something is fine, and negative comments are fine. Please do not directly tell other participants why the thing they like is bad or that they are bad for liking it.


2. Kink shaming will be deleted.


3. Racism, homophobia, transphobia, antisemitism, misogyny, etc will be deleted.


2. Discussing material from the books is fine, but if you're going to discuss something that happens in future episodes, or the fate of historical characters, please put it under a cut and title the comment Book spoilers! or something similar.


3. Likewise, wanting to treat the show as a self-contained unit and not engage with the books/history is perfectly valid.

How to do an in-comment spoiler cut:
<details><summary>Describe what you're spoiling here</summary>All the spoilers go in this part.</details>

Comments

[muccamukk]

Yes, the scene with them coming back was so sweet and funny. It was great contrast to everything going straight to hell. (Though reminds me a bit of the HBO cliche where the minute you see a character being happy about something, you know they're doomed.)

What was the klezmer song?

The only conclusion I have is the change in directors, but I don't have enough data to nail that down yet. The writer is the same. If it works out to be true, I may die mad about giving the A Block to Mr. Dickface.

[sovay]

Yes, the scene with them coming back was so sweet and funny. It was great contrast to everything going straight to hell. (Though reminds me a bit of the HBO cliche where the minute you see a character being happy about something, you know they're doomed.)

The definition of buying the farm! But unlike many previous scenes of theoretical camaraderie, it worked. I cared that they were reunited and happy. And two missions in two days is meat grinder enough already ("Aren't they supposed to rotate the squadrons?" – "Who else have they got?") and then it just gets worse. I didn't come in knowing the history of this bomber group. The scale of the wipeout was effective.

What was the klezmer song?

It was probably cheating to call it klezmer just because it's a Jewish dude on a clarinet, but the little riff that Rosie is humming during the raid is Artie Shaw's "The Chant." In its big-band form, it's a serious earworm. And I loved the character note of the humming because I couldn't tell if he was doing it out of concentration or to steady his own nerves or project reassurance to the rest of his crew, but it felt real: a human quirk. A lot of this episode felt suddenly in focus in a way that the show until then had not.

The only conclusion I have is the change in directors, but I don't have enough data to nail that down yet. The writer is the same. If it works out to be true, I may die mad about giving the A Block to Mr. Dickface.

*looks up director of first four episodes, unknown to me except by name and CV*

Jeez, yeah, potential same.