Tin Cans
 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FWxcL...os=4Cz8m89RW84

and ff

Nice found or rubbish ? What do you think ?

Just writing for myself I really dislike those pseudo-documenteries with the over dramatic soundtracks and CGI cartoonish light shows. Most that I have watched have about the same historical depth as the Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck re-telling of the Robin Hood legend.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mw9va...eature=related

With some notable exceptions, in the hands of most producers television is far too superficial a medium to do justice to any complex historical event. Too bad that many viewers think 44-minutes of narrowly focused and highly subjective narrative actually qualifies as real analysis. But history on TV is popular as it requires niether effort or thinking...

For all that, if the action off Samar was not the finest hours of the USN it should be high in the top five. For a pretty good and fairly recent account see Last Stand of the Tin Can Sailors by James Hornfischer.

http://www.amazon.com/Last-Stand-Tin...8963971&sr=8-1

Buy it at Amazon and help out SubSim.

As long as they give a good general overview (which they usually do), i have no problem with them. Infact, im all for these said documentaries because people this day and age are visual learners. If it didn't play out like watching a dramatic movie, people simply wouldn't watch them and remain completely ignorant of events.

I watched this episode on the History Channel and found it to be fairly, historically accurate. I for one, will be the first to admit that I don't trust television to be a reliable source of accurate information but, in the case of this series, it is taken from first hand accounts of people who were there. The idea is to read various accounts, or get information from various sources, to help complete the overall picture. Even a Captain from one of the ships will not be able to give an account from every commander's perspective. That is, even he won't know what happened during each phase of the engagement except that which involved his own ship. He may have an idea of what transpires with the other ships but, not every detail. Plus, this is the series "Dogfight" and is dealing with the heroics of specific individual pilots. I rather enjoyed watching it. It certainly isn't rubbish.:) As in all television, a certain level of drama was added to make it more appealing to those who are less historically interested.

I agree with you on this Ducimus. :yep:

I did notice some details were left out or not explained, but this is the way history needs to be learned these days or the young people will just get bored and not care. I've seen a better version of this battle on History Television. This version seems kind of jumpy, jumping around without a smooth flow of the events. If I didn't already know this battle, I'd be quite confused after watching this.

:cry: almost makes me wanna be in a ten can.... Respect for those brave men that fought the IJN with there escorts and DD's I always knew those bastards were crazy.

You should check out Destroyer Command, it's an interesting game where you play a tin can.:03:
http://www.subsim.com/ssr/destroy1.html

Discovery's WW2 in HD covered this the best in my opinion. With interviews of the surviving servicemen and actors readings from servicemen's letters it is really riveting. The pain and fear in one man's voice as he related the story of his shipmates struggles in shark infested water was heart rending If you have not seen this series I highly recommend giving it a try.