I appreciate the kind words. They picked a show that I've seen a thousand times and read just about all the companion books on, along with a bunch more on WWII and history in general, so there's a lot I have to say on the subject (just wished I'd jumped in on the comments at the start of the series). That being said,…

It's a good moment, but only if you've got a background in having read the book. Maybe some of the episodes got cut for time or what have you, but there are lines of dialogue sprinkled throughout the series that make no sense without the book as a guidepost. Everyone here is correct that the Germans relied a lot on…

For anyone who's interested, and I've sort of alluded to it in one sub-thread or another here, back when TV critic Alan Sepinwall did his own re-watch of the series on his old blog, when it came time to cover this episode, John Orloff, who scripted the piece, turned up in the comments section of the post. The full…

There you go. It's been about 6 years since I read his book, and I've only read it the once, but I knew I wasn't mistaken about that part. I have to say, outside of Bill and Babe's book, Malarkey's is probably my favorite. It's the closest on an emotional level to the series of any of the companion pieces (I'd say…

To address this specifically, I read a New York Times article last year describing recent research by the National Holocaust Memorial Museum that concluded that in the 12-year run of the Third Reich, there were a combined total of 42,500 SS-run ghettos, concentration camps, slave labor camps, extermination camps,…

Was not aware of (or forgot about) that one. Go ahead with your Easy self, Doc!

There is, actually, footage of the post-liberation cleanup of Kaufering by the citizens of Landsberg that exists, and I have to imagine that this was a significant source for the episode, because the depiction of it in the series looks but EXACTLY like the newsreel footage. Not for the faint of heart or those still…

Maybe the Allied powers knew about it, but the soldiers on the ground didn't and, really, neither did much of the media covering the war for the Allies. Don't forget that all of the camps that were used for the purpose of exterminating the Jews were in Poland, which was liberated by the Russians. Outside of their…

That's it exactly, but the use of the title isn't used to make the Holocaust the justification for the war (particularly since it couldn't be made so until after the fact); it's to demonstrate that there's a larger evil at work, much more than Frank Capra's propaganda films could depict. It lays a reason at the…

Malarkey actually wasn't with the unit when it got to the camp. I don't recall where he was. However, Babe Heffron actually managed to mention the episode of the camp, however briefly, in the book he and Guarnere wrote.

Actually, his uniform is that of a Wermacht (regular army) officer, not a Nazi, so I've never read the Nazi angle into her look, but it's not an unreasonable assumption. The one I like, and I've heard it bandied about more than a few times, is that the tables have turned, but on the premise that she knew, or at least…

Yeah, something about him getting court-martialed and nobody ever told him about it, but due to some kind of glitch in the system, he still got a paycheck every week…

It did happen. Easy liberated Kaufering IV, a satellite camp of Dachau, near Landsberg. What's interesting about this episode is that it amounts to a single paragraph in the book. Likewise, the prologue mentions nothing about it, partly because, as the review says, it gives the reveal all the more impact, but the lack…

The fraternizing thing happened with the Allied soldiers, including Easy company, a lot, primarily in England before the war (as the English of the time often complained in the buildup before D-Day, "The American GI is overpaid, oversexed and 'over here'"), but also in Germany, so what was depicted was far from…

This is probably the most glaring example outside of Blithe never recovering from his wounds that is the inevitable result of the miniseries being based on a book, and that book being based largely on historical anecdotes from the men being depicted. Liebgott was raised Catholic, but his fellow soldiers were under the…

Don't forget that the world has also had a Pope who was a Nazi in training. Before he was Pope Benedict XVI, Joseph Ratzinger was a member of the Hitler Youth. I've always thought the Allies went too easy on them, as well. Of more than 6,500 SS who worked at Auschwitz in its roughly 5 years of existence, only 15%…

Actually, this is another bit of invented history that the miniseries threw at us. While Webster was a Toccoa Man, he wasn't in E Company from the time of its formation (as his narration in this episode states); Webster was originally attached to the 2nd Battalion HQ Company and was reassigned to Easy when they…

I would agree with this, at least to the effect that the stories the men told said what they said, but it's the defining characteristic in his character's story; they wrote full scenes around it (like the fight between him and Guarnere in "Curahee"). That's a lot to pin on anecdotal evidence.

Going along with this, and it totally fucks up the narrative of the next episode, Liebgott wasn't Jewish, and he wasn't a cab driver in civilian life, either; he was a Catholic barber.

None that I'm aware of, but an argument can certainly be made that his portrayal wasn't entirely fair, either. Part of the portrayal of anyone in the series is also that it's partially colored by the fact that the book and series were based on the recollections of the men who served, so you got the portrayal of Dike…