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Reviews
Atlas of Cursed Places (2020)
Hack Fraud Wannabe RationalWiki Show GueStarring Dim-Witted Michael Shermerst
Well !! It is quite eponymous with my review title. A tatooed, cool, muscle guy trying to seem edgy-sciency by spewing meaningless words like rational, plausaible, mundane, human mind playing tricks, mass hypnosis, myths. Oh and of course Occam's Razor, because nobody can be the edgy-sciency guy without uttering it. As another reviewer has said half of the show is slow motion shots of the presenter babbling those nonsense; "In fact the series over all is more interested in Sam than the actual content he's meant to be investigating, as he poses in the dark in set piece rooms." Someone just described RationalWiki as "Rationality is their flag, not their method." This show trying to emulate it is just the caricature of a caricature. It is absolute disaster.
Hitler's Last Stand (2018)
Good Cases, Awful Reenactments
The documentary series presents snippets of small unit action - battalion level - from the Western Front. The first two episodes I've watched covers the assault on "Abbaye D'Ardenne" by 1st Battalion Canadian Regina Rifle Regiment and the storm on "Fort Montbarey" by a battlegroup consisting of U.S. 121st Engineer Battalion, U.S. 1st Bn, 116th under Maj Tom Dallas and the "Crocodile" tanks of B Squadron, 141st Regiment of the Royal Armoured Corps. The former is a snippet of the "Battle for Caen" and the latter "Battle of Brest".
The concept is good: Take an interesting battalion level small unit action, which by the way in both cases turn out to be an assault on a fortified position, from a larger battle and tell the story. The cases are also well chosen.
However the overall quality of reenactment is hideous. One can bear the usual low budget effects and scaled down extras, a few soldiers representing the companies, but by god acting is unbearable. The one playing the Kurt Meyer is especially annoying. The equipment is not accurate. Crocodiles represented by Shermans, British Tankers wearing American suits etc. The story telling is usually good except lausy order of battles. How many of the Germans were on those fortified positions we do not told and I had to look up internet in order to figure out "Regina Rifles" is a battalion strength unit. If you're going to tell us small unit action you have to do it properly and give us necessary details.
Overall; good concept, bad execution.