Now That I've Seen It

Last night I stayed up late and watched the first two episodes of PBS's Carrier.

I tried to keep an open mind, and not be prejudicial, but sadly, I'm so close to the material in question that I failed miserably. In any event, because I went and made a big fuss in the last post, I feel I owe my two readers, an explanation of how I think.

I like the over-all format. Stick a camera on the USS Nimitz as it deploys, and see what happens. It's pretty honest, and really educational to Navy outsiders. But the show is chock-full of musical montages, and it comes across as a bit "Top Gun"-ish. But they are well interspersed and provide information and action to what would otherwise be just a big collection of interviews, so I consider that element a wash.

I said before that the life being depicted is old-hat to me. It's all as I remember it. I didn't serve on a carrier, but the kinds of people you meet, the dynamics, and the stress are all there. My enjoyment in this series came in answering some of my wife's questions, and seeing her get some clarity on why things are, the way they are. The sailors they pick to follow are pretty typical, and provide a very nice example of the kinds of people that make up the fleet. I especially liked that they opened with the Command Master Chief, introducing him and his job gives a great contrast to all of the junior sailors that we end up following later. The Commanding Officer actually managed to appear to be candid without spewing practiced PR speak. But in the end, it was just appearance, and little of consequence was said. The one sailor they followed that I had any problem with was airman Garzone who is a bit of an amateur documentarian (in his bid to join the Navy's Journalist cadre). The show follows him for a bit in what felt like one filmmaker gravitating to another. A moment I found impressive was the Disciplinary Review Board (DRB), where the chief's mess was dressing down an airman for having alcohol on board the ship. I would have liked to have seen the subsequent Executive Officer's Inquiry (XOI) and the Captain's Mast (that typically follow the DRB). But I certainly understand why we can't. But later we learn the results, and the viewers learn about the concept of non-judicial punishment. I'm hopeful that there are more such surprises later-on in the series.

Finally, I found the program to be well produced, and clearly the labor of love. Big props go for not contriving drama in the editing room (at least not detectably) and somehow getting what would normally be a closed-off group of people (and I'm referring to the entire crew of the carrier) to almost pretend the camera isn't being stuffed in their faces, and that deserves your attention.