I recently finished War and Remembrance, the sequel to The Winds of War. I liked a lot of it, and I can understand why War and Remembrance, unlike The Winds of War, won the Emmy for Best Miniseries. I was amazed that, at a time when remote controls were already available, so much time was spent on epic scenes on a network show, be it in a concentration camp, in a submarine during a battle, or in an airplane during an air raid. Despite everything that struck me as positive due to the intensity of how everythibg was presented, two facts surprised me negativly.
The Japanese were portrayed as, if at all, completely emotionless. While the Nazis showed a lot of emotion, the Japanese showed none. Was it because Herman Wouk, who wrote the novels that served as the basis for the miniseries and also contributed to the screenplay, was an officer in the Pacific during World War II and, due to his personal experiences, didn't want to portray the Japanese as human?
The atomic bomb was barely addressed. Five minutes were devoted to the first atomic bomb test and a brief discussion among the characters present about whether the atomic bomb should really be used—according to the characters, it should be used because it would end the war and thus save the lives of American and Japanese soldiers. Shortly before the end of the miniseries, one of the main characters was seen walking past a newsstand at the train station. The newspaper said "Hiroshima Whipped," but that was all we learned about it, which was surprising, because the entire miniseries was narrated by a narrator. The fact that and how exactly the war with Japan was ended was not mentioned at all by the narrator. I wonder why the two atomic bombings were so ignored. Did ABC want to protect US viewers from them at the time, or was it the work of author Herman Wouk?
