Our sometime reviewer Jim is back, and this time he has enlisted for a weekly viewing of Generation Kill, the new US drama from the men behind The Wire, David Simon and Ed Burns. Here’s what he made of the first episode, ‘Get Some’…
“The Marines Corps is like America’s little pitbull. They beat us, starve us, and once in a while they let us out to attack somebody.”
David Simon and Ed Burns’ Generation Kill started its seven-episode run on FX last nighty and, as you’d hope and expect from the creators of The Wire, the episode ‘Get Some’ didn’t pull any punches in its depiction of US Marines preparing for war in Iraq.
As they wait in Kuwait for the order to invade, the troops bond by practising their martial arts, reading porn mags, mocking supportive letters from schoolchildren back home, and trying to find out if rumours of J.Lo’s death are true. They also fix their Humvees out of their own pockets, deal with appalling wind storms in the desert, and question why they’ve been sent woodland camouflage for a desert war.
The series is based on a book by Evan Wright, a Rolling Stone reporter who was embedded with the Marines of First Recon Battalion. Although treated with suspicion by the soldiers when he first arrives, he gains their confidence when he tells them he used to write for the porn mag, Hustler.
Generation Kill is like a hardcore Band of Brothers. It’s not comfortable viewing, but that’s its strength. Evan Wright has said that the series aims to portray the Marines as they are, not as people back home think they ought to be. It’s not a series where you’ll find any Hollywood-sentimentality or emotive music.
The first episode ends with the order to tell surrendering Iraqis to return to their own lines and an uncertain fate. It’s a disturbing sign of things to come. As one Marine comments: ‘Iraqis first contact with Americans – we **** ‘em’.
