Comments on: Sons of Liberty – Miniseries Review

By: Bailey Cavender

Bailey Cavender — Wed, 17 Feb 2016 19:54:00 +0000

In reply to ajdp.

He really isn’t…lol.

Not a problem, I understand completely, and wish I had the same memories of a the History Channel. It makes me sad that my first reaction to seeing that the History Channel has done something major on the American Revolution is to think that it won’t be at all accurate; they should not be the channel I expect that from!

By: ajdp

ajdp — Wed, 17 Feb 2016 19:01:00 +0000

In reply to Bailey Cavender.

Yeah, Ben Barnes certainly isn’t hard to look at. LOL Sorry for the long rant– I’m old enough to remember when the History Channel had more history and less fiction, and even though I *know* that’s not the case anymore stuff like this still takes me by surprise sometimes. Expectations were definitely too high on my side, and then I had to spend over an hour explaining to a family friend that a lot of it wasn’t true or was only partially true. So yeah. I may be a wee bit prejudiced against this production. 😉

By: Bailey Cavender

Bailey Cavender — Wed, 17 Feb 2016 16:06:00 +0000

In reply to Faith. But yeah, I did love it in spite of that having to remember that it wasn't accurate because of the acting, cimematography, and brilliant score.

By: Bailey Cavender

Bailey Cavender — Wed, 17 Feb 2016 04:58:00 +0000

In reply to Faith.

Thank you Faith! My big thing with it is just to know what you’re getting into… In “The Big Bang Theory,” there’s an episode where one of the characters can’t stand the Ren Fair because it’s too historically inaccurate, so he pretends to be Spock on a mission to a planet that is similar to 14th Century Europe. This way, he can explain away all the inaccuracies. That’s how I felt about this. It’s similar to, but not, the American Revolution. Then you can enjoy the good things without going nuts 😀

By: Bailey Cavender

Bailey Cavender — Wed, 17 Feb 2016 04:55:00 +0000

In reply to ajdp.

You make a good point about Sam Adams and the general ages (but, if you have to follow one guy around for five hours, they might as well cast an attractive one!). Lol, kidding about that, though I agree about the general “we’re not going for accuracy” thing. And I think it can be dangerous to just shuffle around facts like they do in this, especially if you’re marketing the series in such a way as to make people expect accuracy.

For me, I went into this expecting something with the historical accuracy of “Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter,” so I was pleasantly surprised to see even a little bit of realness 🙂

I agree, there is amazing potential in that time period for a fabulous and realistic miniseries, that maintains the truth of the events. There was some fascinating stuff and the characters portrayed were really important in the scheme of the Revolution.

I know that you’re right about the majority of people just accepting it as truth (because it’s on the History Channel), but I would like to think that we’re just being cynical…

By: Faith

Faith — Wed, 17 Feb 2016 04:00:00 +0000

Loved your review Bailey! I remember seeing the trailer for this but was hesitant because I didn’t know how badly they would butcher history and the American Revolution is one of my “favorites” in history. I’m glad you enjoyed it despite its flaws; it really makes me want to give it a try as well. 😀

By: ajdp

ajdp — Tue, 16 Feb 2016 21:59:00 +0000

I should preface this by saying that I didn’t make it all the way through the series because there is only so much teeth-knashing I can bear to do. 😉 I’m not a historian, but I am a lover of history and what irks me most about things like this is that they take historical figures and historical events, distort them, change them, twist them until the only resemblance they have to the truth is their names, and then have the gall to wash their hands of the false history they are presenting by saying asinine things like we strive for “authenticity not accuracy.” I would question whether you can truly have one without the other, but assuming that it’s possible perhaps they should have made a mini-series set in pre-Revolutionary Boston that featured fictional characters with historical people and events as a backdrop. I would happily watch something like that, because like you said, the acting was good, the cinematography was lovely, and the score was excellent. And as far as ages go– Samuel Adams was born in 1722, so even in the 1760s he was quite a bit older than Ben Barnes (and sadly, likely never as attractive lol.) John Adams was actually 13 years *younger* than his cousin Sam and Hancock was about 15 years younger, which is certainly not what the casting reflects. What really frustrates me is that these were fascinating people and the pre-Revolutionary period in America was a fascinating time. They could have stuck more closely to the truth and still had a wonderful mini-series– and although there will be some people who see this piece of fiction and be inspired to dig into history, there are exponentially more who will simply accept this as factual. And that’s sad.