Having read many classical commentaries such as Plutarch, Herodotus, Xenophon, Thucydides, Suetonius and others (yes, including Caesar's Commentaries on the Gallic War), I guess I could be called a history buff, although hardly an expert.
This series on Rome is interesting, if not fleshed out with enough detail, suffers from many similar documentaries in which some scholar/narrator engages in what feels like a vanity show in which we watch the narrator lecture us from various locations. We see a lot less of the location than closeups of the narrator's face. We also get to see the scholar staring in awe at one historical location after another, and pretending that he/she is seeing all this for the first time.
The narrative is never "We are now in XXX and this is YYY". It's always "Now I am going to XXX to learn ZZZ", as though the narrator had no clue what would be found and what could be learned that is not already well explained in dozens of books.
Perhaps the History Channel feels this repetitious format is necessary to draw viewers, but it does get tiresome in program after program.
I'm more inclined to go with the line from Dragnet, "Just the facts", rather than watch.
This series on Rome is interesting, if not fleshed out with enough detail, suffers from many similar documentaries in which some scholar/narrator engages in what feels like a vanity show in which we watch the narrator lecture us from various locations. We see a lot less of the location than closeups of the narrator's face. We also get to see the scholar staring in awe at one historical location after another, and pretending that he/she is seeing all this for the first time.
The narrative is never "We are now in XXX and this is YYY". It's always "Now I am going to XXX to learn ZZZ", as though the narrator had no clue what would be found and what could be learned that is not already well explained in dozens of books.
Perhaps the History Channel feels this repetitious format is necessary to draw viewers, but it does get tiresome in program after program.
I'm more inclined to go with the line from Dragnet, "Just the facts", rather than watch.