Masters Of The Air Review: The Latest Spielberg/Hanks WWII Series Never Gets Off The Ground

At some point during the so-called peak TV era, someone, somewhere got it in their head that all prestige TV dramas have to unfold like one long movie. Indeed, time and time again, when creators sit down to talk about their new shows, they'll say things like, "We treated this like a 9-hour movie!" But here's the thing: no one wants to watch a 9-hour movie. Why can't TV just be ... TV? "Mad Men," one of the best TV shows of the peak era, told an overarching story but each episode remained, well, episodic. They were like short stories in a collection. The collection added up as a whole, but you could still take the stories individually. And the results were wonderful.

"Masters of the Air" is the new World War II drama series from executive producers Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks (John Shiban and John Orloff created the show), and serves as a companion piece to Spielberg and Hanks' shows "Band of Brothers" and "The Pacific." Here's the thing: those shows weren't afraid to be episodic. They told individual stories that added up to a whole. Not so with "Masters of the Air," which is limp, and derivative, and, worst of all, unfolds like one long movie. To be sure, the show is a spectacle. As I watched it, I marveled at all the work that went into the series — the massive cast, the impressive costumes, the props, the sets, the entire world the show exists in, it's all very impressive. And yet, I felt almost nothing as the nine-episode drama unfolded like one long movie. Well, I guess that's not entirely true. 

I did feel a little bored. 

"Masters of the Air" follows the fighting men of the 100th Bomb Group (nicknamed the "Bloody Hundredth") as they battle the Nazis during World War II. The show is loaded with characters, but the main focus is primarily on two best buddies — Major Gale Cleven (Austin Butler) and Major John Egan (Callum Turner). Gale is nicknamed "Buck" while John is called "Bucky," and the fact that they have similar nicknames is about the extent of their character development. The two leads do the best that they can with the material, and Turner manages to stand out with John's more self-destructive tendencies. Butler, meanwhile, is still doing his "Elvis" voice, to the point where I wonder if that's just what he sounds like. In any case, it's impossible to listen to his dialogue and not think of him doing an Elvis impersonation. 

Other characters come and go, like Nate Mann as Major Robert "Rosie" Rosenthal, a self-proclaimed Jew from Brooklyn who can't shake the horrors of war. Barry Keoghan pops up doing a very bad New Yawk accent as Lt. Curtis Biddick. And then there's Anthony Boyle as Major Harry Crosby, a navigator who is prone to air sickness. For reasons that are never quite clear, Crosby serves as the narrator of the show, and his narration, through no fault of the actor, is clumsy and exposition-heavy, to the point where you can't help but wish it had been cut entirely — the show simply doesn't need it. The second-to-last episode brings in some of the Tuskegee Airmen to add some much-needed diversity to the story, but this feels like an afterthought. Simply put, none of these men are particularly interesting, and it's a chore to follow them through the hells of battle.

One thing "Masters of the Air" does well is hammer home how scary all of this was for these men. When they take to the air, they're putting themselves in imminent danger, and that danger is constantly on display here. It's pointed out that when the British go out on bombing runs, they do so at night, to avoid detection. The Americans, however, fly during the day, putting themselves on full display for German pilots to attack. This results in several harrowing sequences full of bodies being torn apart but aircraft fire. As a showcase for the dangers of war, "Masters of the Air" succeeds.

Unfortunately, it falls flat in nearly every other regard. The storyline that unfolds across the 9 episodes is lifeless, and it's loaded with clunky dialogue, like when a character says, "Your friend was on that plane because Adolf Hitler and his gang of thugs thought they could rule the world!" I'm all for heightened dialogue, but there's no life here; no oomph. When compared to the energy of "Band of Brothers" and "The Pacific," and the film that inspired them, Spielberg's "Saving Private Ryan," "Masters of the Air" is like an overloaded aircraft struggling to get off the ground. 

All of this should be exciting, vibrant, thrilling! But it's not. The show merely crashes when it should soar, and it becomes tiresome to sit through. It's hard to become invested with these men when they remain so stagnant, so uninteresting. There are a few flourishes here and there, like an indoor bicycle race shot exquisitely, but these are few and far between. And I can't help but think that if the show would be far more successful had it taken a more episodic approach, and told individual stories that stood on their own. Instead, we get a 9-hour movie. And like I said, no one wants to watch a 9-hour movie.

/Film Rating: 5 out of 10

"Masters of the Air" premieres January 26, 2024 on Apple TV+.