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(More customer reviews)Perhaps you had to have seen them. One fan has observed that trying to explain what they were like creates bewilderment in present day baseball fans. This series (along with others that have been done) is the next best thing.I fear that people who never saw them might think think the series sentimental. But there is a difference between sentimentality and sentiment. And this series though filled with sentiment is never sentimental. This lovingly crafted documentary gives a fine sense of what the team represented--passion, democracy, and community. The centerpoint of the series is Jackie Robinson--and rightly so; but what a great team they were! Duke,Campy, Pee Wee Gil , Clem,and the wonderfully humane Carl Erskine are presented in all their glory. One complaint that will resonate only with those who remember the moment: I wish this series had shown footage of the catch Duke made off what seemed a certain homerun by Willy Jones--a catch that rivals Willie Mays famous catch in the 54 world series. Jake Pitler the Dodger first base coach thought the Duke's the best catch he had seen since 1909. Oh, I also think that it is not fair that Vin Scully who replaced Red Barber as the Dodger announcer is not recognized properly)
The inevitability of their destruction a combination of changing social times and real villany (Robert Moses was as ruthless as any Shakespearean villain and as for O'Malloy the joke runs--what would you do if you had Hitler Stalin and O'Malley in the same room a a gun with two bullets? The answer: Shoot O'Malley twice) is the substance of a Shakesperean or Greek tragedy. The comparison is not "academic" Maybe there is one that seems less contrived but I cannot think of any. So just consider: In Shakespeare's Coriolanus. Aufidius a moment before murdering Caius Martius calls him "Boy" and Coriolanus in all his fury and brilliance responds " like an eagle in a dovecote I fluttered your Volscians in Corioles. Alone I did it. Boy!" Jackie Robinson could have said that. He really could have! And Erskine, Duke, dear Clem Labine and the rest of his teammates would have agreed. But they were all eagles. "I have been striken a mortal blow" Agamemnon cries out in Aeshylus' play. New York suffered a mortal blow when the Dodgers left Brooklyn--and I mean mortal. I don't think the city ever recovered. I really don't think the comparison far fetched. I just watched a modernization of Othello in which the great general is reincarnated so to speak as a basketall star--and why not? Anyway, just watch the series and then put bumper stickers on your cars demanding that Gil Hodges be inducted into the Hall of Fame!
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