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@@rustomkanishkaHistoric Persians were fairly nice as ancient societies go. How are they comparable to modern day despotic Iranian religious clerics? If anything, the Greeks are a better fit considering how often autocratic they were.
What Netflix is doing is a "Loosely Based On A Story Inspired By Historical Events (Which Came To Me In A Dream)". I have no confidence in them making a show that is a)good, b)accurate and c)not "for a modern audience".
It's a corporation that decided at some point to have a checklist, like companies going "Green". The quality doesn't matter, the results and intent don't even matter, the checklist matters. Follow the checklist.
Some of their documentaries involving ww2 are good and accurate. Like with "Hitler's Circle of Evil" for example is a great documentary that tells of the men who composed of Hitler's inner circle. They have actors who look the roles, their acting is great, the narration and dialogue is great with historians who are great at giving out the information. So its not all bad at Netflix when it comes to historical documentaries
Historically inaccurate fashion, hair, makeup, & shoes are a huge pet peeve of mine. Imagine studying 1920s fashion for years, then being invited to photograph a Jazz Age party where you can't find a single good costume, so you have to bribe them to do better the next year by offering threr $100 prizes for most historically accurate outfit.
Well ancient discriptions actually say he is blonde and even his hair color in the mosaic(that could've been a artistic interpretation) is dirty blonde(I didn't name the hair color) so I don't think that part is wrong the helmets are a missed opportunity and the bracers are just another Hollywood eyeroll
That movie was such a decent attempt at a movie showing the life of Alexander. I think a GoT style show would also work really well with Alexander's life and then the Wars of the Successors.
@@JohnFreyholtz sue them for what? making low quality products? better idea is for the greeks to showcase their own history with their own movies/documentaries/series.
I intentionally avoid watching things that are designed to get people to watch it just so they can complain about how bad it was. The best thing we could have done regarding the Velma show was just ignore it. Obviously we couldn't do that with Blackpatra because that was actively spreading an intentionally incorrect version of history in order to pander to, I don't know exactly, dumb people who hate racism but also have unexamined racist assumptions? Because everytime I saw an interaction between a critique of Blackpatra versus a defense the critique was always citing the mountains of evidence that Cleopatra was Greek and the defenders just went "Egypt is in Africa, therefore Cleopatra was black."
@@OsirisLord I hadn't realized about the hypocrisy until you mentioned it, the defenders call the people who don't like it racist, while their mindset and defense of it is extremely racist lmao
One of the things that irks me about bracers is that Phillip and Alexander based some of their cavalry reforms on Xenophon's horsemanship manual where among other pieces of equip he suggested that riders wear a forearm guard on the reign arm. This was the one piece of equipment that the Macedonians did not adopt.
Utter nonsense. The cavalry reforms included each unit fighting in their own formations. Alexander had 12 different cavalry units like companions, Thessalians, Thracians, mounted javlinemen, paeonians, greek allied cavalry, heavy lancers, scythian horse archers, arachosians, indians, sogdians etc.
@@okenogamer well going into the invasion Alexander had far fewer, of which the Companions, Thessalians, Podromoi, and Thracians did not wear forearm guards. Maybe, possibly, some of the Greek mercenaries or allies could have, but there is no evidence for it.
@@tonlito22 im not talking about forearm guard. Im talking about tactical formations of his cavalry units that has nothing to do with Xenophon. Furthermore by the time he reached cilicia he already had lancers with him
11:30 that leather armor would also be a pain to put on, with the buckles being over your kidneys. - 24:00 Obviously, those are not Persians, they're Redguard soldiers.
Nothing makes me angrier than two facts about Netflix. 1) Inside Job got canceled but Big Mouth gets to have 8 seasons. 2) There are all these actual stories about African queens people have never heard about and will probably never experience because Netflix catastrophically fucked up the most basic African Queen imaginable. Tausret? Hatshepsut? Nerftiti? Who the fuck are they? Let's take the only Egyptian queen famous for not being Egyptian and make her black. Oh people didn't like this, okay no more African history since apparently people don't care about it.
even Tausret or Hatshepsut probably wouldnt have been subsaharan. iirc Cleopatra also portayed native egyptians with dreases and hair styles etc. from subsaharan people.
I think a lot of people do know who Hatshepsut and Nefertiti are. At least if you have a mild interest in Egyptology. Which a lot of people do. I dont think it is a good topic for a documentary series though. Yes, Egypt was ruled by women, for like a couple years out of 6000 years of history. Big deal. I think most people are kind of fed up with the girl boss narratives these days. Even if they were capable of making a good documentary, it still wouldn't do well. Screwing over Alexander though, I take that personally.
@@undertakernumberone1 Yeah the Wikipedia article on the Libu has great archeological evidence that native Egyptians weren't white but also weren't black. There's Egyptian artwork on the article that features a line of men. The Egyptian man is brown, then there's a white skinned Assyrian, then a black skinned Nubian, and then four white skinned Libu men. Where were the Libu from? Libya, also in Africa.
@TheSuperappelflap if you're going for Egyptian girl bosses than maybe don't pick the "queen" who sold her nation's sovereignty over to Rome in exchange for sex.
To be fair: Afaik the only source that claims Alexander had heterochromia is Plutarch who lived centuries after Alexanders death. So that could be a made-up characteristic, possibly done to paint Alexander as someone marked by the gods and destined for greatness.
Netflix has a problem with presenting documentaries with so many inaccurate or even made up facts. No wonder so many people have so much wrong information about history. I understand when is a movie, artistic licence ment to entertain, but when you present it to a documentary, you should at least try to be accurate to historic facts.
The Alexander movie had a professor take an active role in the making of the movie. It's the most accurate historical movie in regards to how people fought back then. And it's literally on Alexander, Gaugamela etc. They could have at least referred to that. I'd recommend it to anyone who wants to see the closest thing we have to an accurate depiction of how battles would have looked back then.
22:30 To give Netflix much more benefit of the doubt than they have previously (and I expect will prospectively) earned, the spears that are longer than the wielder but not as long as the sarissa might belong to the hypaspsists, a sort of specialized infantry that covered the flanks of the sarissa armed phalangites. The hypaspsists were themselves often covered by flanking cavalry so the shot you reference could feasibly depict the edge of a battleline accurately.
Well, Alexander being blonde is actually one of the few things they got right. The only historical description we have of his hair describes it as “yellow” and/or “like a lion’s mane,” and it predates the mosaic in Pompey (which one I guess could argue to be a dirty blonde, I dunno). As a historian, I thought you’d be up to snuff with that sort of thing…
I was going to post the same thing. Furthermore contemporary sources tended to call him light eyed, usually refering to grey or blue eyes. He is only depicted as having heterochromia in the Alexander Romance over 600 years later.
He was described as having Tawny hair not Yellow. Have you seen a lions mane? It's not yellow and is usually the darkest fur on a lions body so Alexander was most likely a dark dirty blond.
@@kristiannicholson5893just looking at Google Images and this website shows lion's manes as yellow, only the oldest ones have dark fringes or all black.
It's hilarious that so many Content creators are criticizing Netflix for something they did right for once. It's clear that many people don't do their research and read the primary sources that describe Alex's physical appearance. Instead, they just base their claims on the famous Roman Alexander mosaic while not looking at the Macedonian frescoes, which depict Alex with strawberry blond hair. For instance, according to Brett Cooper, who commented on Netflix Alexander, Alexander the Great was too Anglo-looking and should've been portrayed as a dark Mediterranean, given his Greek heritage. She is unaware that blonde hair and pale complexions were common in Macedonia, Greece's northernmost region. Of course, most Greeks would have looked like George Clooney or Colin Farell with their natural dark hair, but Alex was pale and blond or red-blonde.
They had a Mural copy they made of that on my Middle School hallway. It was always badass to walk down the hall and see ol Alexander in all his glory lol
No... They were way worse than this at least the Persians and Greeks have colour on their clothers. And use shields like shields. @@OnlyDeathIsEternal
Just imagine: a few thousand years from now someone could be legit make a series depicting the Battle of Gettysburg. But Robert E. Lee has a Death Star sittin in the background and everyone is driving around in humvees whacking eachother with pool noodles.
They sure got stirrups early in history. I'm just glad they didn't show a bunch of archers with 10lb bows that sent out wobbling arrows. But at least they had the dude leaping into battle.
I mean, stirrups are a right bugger to get in a show, there's insurance, training for both actors and horses, it just makes things a lot harder and can even be outright impossible depending on the studio and even laws depending on where its filmed. Almost no movie, show or series has stirrupless horses, even ones that are in all other aspects very good.
It's actually offensive how Netflix seems to go out of it's way to be as historically inaccurate as humanely possible. How do they even manage it? I genuinely cannot understand, it's not like it would hard to have the costume department study this matter for 15 minutes and realize how stupid all the designs are....
I forget what it was, but I watched a show depicting Alexander's battle against the Persian leader. It stayed at a fairly high camera level and only came down to emphasize certain decisions/actions by Alexander or the Persian lord. Despite the dramatic depiction, at least it kept the soldiers in formation and had the Macedonians stay in formation when clashing with the Iranians (also in formation). The main downside I remember from this ancient video is that there weren't any archers.
Blindly charging into the enemy without formations is definitely an accurate representation of how an army that changed the world under a commander who would be renown throughout history as one of the greatest generals of all time fought. Definitely. Tactics and strategy are for people who lack military greatness. (Yes mostly just commenting to comment for the algorithm).
On the topic of cavalry spears, a little known fact is that the spears were tipped at both ends so that if one end broke off they could simply turn it around.
Considering how big part of overall budget for historical/fantasy series is the costume and prop departments, and how big budgets we are talking about in few years past.... I am really surprised that we dont see in news some scandals regarding embezzlements, IRS raids, outright stealing. Dunno where did the money go, but for sure not into costumes and props.
Stacked Cookies channeling my pained historian noises for this. They didn't even *try* with this one, it's getting depressing at this point. Not to mention obviously catering to the current regime in Tehran in the depiction of the Persians.
Tbf about the hair colour....he has multiple times been described as "Xanthos" wich means blonde in greek even to day and in roman Xathos was not someone with very light brown hair (thats ehat they called blonde ) but someone with light yellowish hair.
The worst part is we have a movie already that was fairly accurate in its depiction of Alexander the Great. One that was made in 2004. (Unless I'm confusing it with the 1956 one)
I don't think I would've wanted Netflix to make it, but a show about empress Taytu of Ethiopia would be great, and if you're trying to show times when African queens did great things she's right up thay alley. During her husband's reign, he may have been the one technically in charge but he was only so effective because it was the 2 of them working together, equally important. And as he got weaker, and then for a while after he died, she was the single most powerful person in all of Ethiopia, more so than the emperors.
I watched a video a few years ago, likely here on YT, in which a guy created a set of Linothorax armor via the same general method they reportedly did so back then. Many layers of strong linen glued together and left to cure/harden. It was shockingly hard and effective at stopping stabs and arrows from puncturing through once it was ready. Very informative, recommend a look. Unfortunately I've seen some references off-handedly refer to linothorax armor simply as a "linen armor" or "layered linen" in a shorthand comment. Which doesn't quite get across how strong that armor was due to the resulting effect of it's composite make-up. I think some people take the simplified "linen armor" statement to incorrectly mean that they were just thick plain cloth or, as in this docu-drama's case, padded/stuffed linen gambesons. Which is a sad misunderstanding and doesn't convey how ingenious and effective linothorax was for the time.
Ahem... guys... Bracers? Check 22:26 Looks to me like the Macedonians are using stirrups. In 331 BC. And maybe that's because it's already difficult to find people willing to ride a horse with stirrups, let alone without. But in HBO's Rome, they taught the actors to ride the horse without stirrups...
You should check out the Hard Core History Addendum episode 9 "Glimpses of Olympia". Dan goes into some of history and lore surrounding Alexander's mother. Woman was something else.
Because people generally accept strirrups as a technical limitation. It would be too big of a hassle, due to insurance/liability/training to not use them.
Oliver Stone’s Alexander addressed that issue in a pretty innovative way. They definitely had stirrups, but they pared them right back to the bare minimum to be function and made them of clear material so that it was quite to see them, giving the appearance of not having them in the first place. Netflix could easily have done something similar, though that could be said about pretty much everything in this travesty of a show
At a Netflix producers' meeting: "I still can't believe how much backlash we got on the Cleopatra series." "Do you think that means we need to do a better job with the historical research the next time around? Or maybe even just go for historical fiction instead of trying to do a documentary? "What the heck does that have to do with anything?" "Yeah. There's only one possible explanation for why our last series wasn't a hit." "Exactly. It's because everybody that didn't like it is a racist." "Ok, so how about this. For our next series, let's make whoever we pick as a main character into a blue-eyed blonde." "Brilliant! That's obviously what audiences care about more than anything. We can't lose!" *Netflix's Alexander the Great receives backlash over glaring historical inaccuracies.* Next meeting: "I don't get it! What is wrong with these people??"
If my memory is right the sarissa's were 16 feet long. Alex's innovation being to let the guys further back attack from safety making them mor eenthusiastic and safe while the front formed an unbreakable shield wall.
I’m surprised that you didn’t mention the stirrups seen with the cavalry. Alexander and his companion cavalry did not have saddles as we know them nor stirrups.
The only historian involved was some unpaid intern who was instructed on what Things He should Look Up on Wikipedia, and told Not to offer any other Suggestions or corrections.
Imagine charging full tilt into the enemy with both hands on your spear and no stirrups to platform. The thighs on those men must have been magnificient
From what we know historically, this is one of the greatest story's in history. Instead of telling us this amazing tale Netflix once again thinks they can do better...
I would actually love to see you reviewing a well made Docudrama, like HBO's Band of Brothers, which is pretty accurate depiction of historical events based on the recollection of soldiers that served in 101st airborne. Because that is an example of how such show should be done, and could be done well. You know, just to see a bit of positivity, maybe :D
Turbans are there bcs netflix thinks that audience in the US of A is too dumb to figure out this is going on in the Middle East without visual aid (turbans, scimitars) stereotypically associated with that area and to hell with historical accuracy. As for battle formations, I guess they thought fighting in formation isn't as sexy as gladiator style 1v1 meelee. That's the same reason why Netflix Alex is blonde with blue eyes. Completely idiotic.
To answer your opening question: Netflix knows cable is dying, but also knows the most people kept cable to watch daytime TV (history channel, baking shows, W network, lifetime, hallmark, etc.) So they've put A LOT of money into stealing that market away from cable as they also know thats what most of their audience watches. Sadly, the majority of people use TV as white noise to drown out their thoughts while they do menial house labour, or at the end of the long day. So Netflix primarly makes what use to be called 'boob tv' (terrible name with misogynistic connotations, but is what it is) in order to keep these subscribers that only watch trash TV. In short: Netflix has taken the torch from The History Channel with these series. Its not about making historically accurate programs, its about making easy to digest, in-offensive, tell the audience what they already know with cheap enactments, to keep them engaged while they do their chores, work, or eat diner after a long day. Netflix doesn't give a flying fuck about their subscribers or the quality of the content they put out. They only care about viewer counts, so if these dumbass "history" shows bring the viewer counts then they'll keep pumping em out the exact same way that the History Channel used to do for decades. It's mindless garbage, it's supposed to be mindless garbage, and unfortunately we the consumers let it happen and are to blame for it. If we want quality we have to put out money and attention towards it. This means not watching crap like these documentaries and watching the shows and films of quality. Quality is subjective, sure fair enough, and using critics ratings isn't always the answer. But a mixture of critic recommendations from people you trust, friend and family recommendations, plus just a little but of risk and reward - literally just trying things at random and seeing if you'll like it, rather than choosing the safe choice or whatever the "top 10" throws at you - will give better rewards and will stop this garbage from being made. Want better art? Support better art. Want Netflix to stop producing garbage? Then stop watching it (Except you HoEP, but we all love when you rip to shreds this trash, but for the rest of us, stop giving netflix viewer counts for shit)
But the thing is. People arent watching these shows. Of course Netflix doesnt release numbers but we all know that more people watched youtube videos about that Cleopatra show than people actually watched it. It doesnt matter to Netflix, they will keep making this type of content. Because rewriting history is what they want to do. And this company has barely made any profit since it was conceived, and has lost billions of dollars. They dont care about the money. Its about sending the message.
The drabness of the armor of the first photo might be the armor just being covered in dirt and dust from a long march depending on when it takes place in his campaigns, (not sure haven't seen it yet) and maybe still be colorful underneath. But that's probably giving Netflix a little to much credit.
Honestly at first glance I was confused because I thought he was fighting middle eastern/ Ottoman troops from the helmets alone. (No im not referring to janissaries) Which is quite a long time off.
I want to believe the reason they used the wrong Persian helmets is due to not wanting to cover up the actors' faces, but it's probably just them not caring.
You know it's pretty hilarious that Netflix is blaming the failure of it's other docu-dramas on bigotry meanwhile their costume department is apparently going "Persia. That's in the Middle-East right? Yeah they definitely all wore turbans over there." It's pretty sad that Netflix is well on their way to making a less historically accurate version of Alexander the Great's story than the Colin Farrell one.
If I recall, I read that there is no historical documentation from Alexander's time that he had heterochromia. The Alexander Romance is more fiction than historical.
I bet the color is a deliberate choice to make it easier to CGI the 'army' in. The spear was a great innovation at the time - I remember rading they were fragile too if not used right. :) One of Rome's generals (Pompey the Great maybie?) really wanted Alexanders long curly locks. So at least the Romans thought he had long hair. Perhaps the leather is for the Persians light conscript forces? I always thought Alexander didnt believe in the god thing at first but the 'prophets' kept feeding him poisoned words till he lost his mind and thought it was real. Netflix didnt learn from the racism they had before.
"The spear was a great innovation at the time" What? The spear is probably the oldest weapon of history, if we consider choppers like tools and not weapons, how is it an innovation? XD Unless you mean the Sarissa, in that case, yeah it's an innovation, but it's more the tactics and formations that are the innovation ^^ "Perhaps the leather is for the Persians light conscript forces? " I'm pretty sure leather is more expensive than cloth XD
At 13:00 not only did Philip create the Macedonian war machine but he also conquered Greece. And then Alexander had to spend 2 years reconquering it which probably should have been mentioned in the Netflix show. The Macedonians would be like barbarian Scotland conquering England then going on to defeat Europe, so worth a mention.
Philip didn't conquer Greece, the Macedonians identified as Greeks themselves and considered Greece their mother country. Therefore the intention of Philip was to bring stability to Greece and NOT to conquer what he considered his mother country, he was anxious to pacify the warring states in the south of Greece as a prelude to uniting Greece. Philip thus created the Pan-Hellenic league or league of Greek and only Greek states with Macedonia as the Leading Greek state and Philip himslelf as HEGEMON or leader of the Greeks..
Philip did NOT conquer Greece. Philip considered Greece the mother country, why would he conquer his own mother country. Philip created the PAN-HELLENIC LEAGUE or league of Greek and only Greek states with Macedonia as the leading Greek state and Philip himself as ruller of all the Greeks. It was literally a unification of Greece by Philip into an imperial Greece.
Best docu-drama I have ever seen, was 'Nancy Wake: The White Mouse'- it was well-told, artistic without being gratuitous, & I finished it feeling elevated by the viewing, & wanting to know more about her- I *didn't* spend my time banging my head against my desk, wondering what the hell they doing- why they were changing WWII history & figures. This isn't rocket-science: the formula to good entertainment, that's also informative - is to make good entertainment, that's also informative...
@@Gluckdrache That's Achilles but I take your point. Personally I'll be interested to see if they mention his reported attraction to young boys and eunuchs. If memory serves those reports come from the same source (Dicaearchus) that tells us about his relationship with Hephaestion. The show is a great opportunity to talk about ancient attitudes towards sex and attraction in a grown-up forum: I look forward to them inevitably putting their foot in it.
This is so accurate to history because we all know that people were stupid and suicidal back in the days, it's not like they had something to come back to like loved ones right?
One of the things that worries me is that this trailer seems to insinuate that Alexander invaded Persia due to his father's assassination, when in reality Alexander was merely taking over an invasion that had already begun under Phillip.
'"They say that the most amiable and beautiful amongst the Greeks was Alcibiades; amongst the Romans, Scipio. It is reported also that Demetrius Poliorcetes contended in Beauty. They affirm likewise that Alexander Son of Philip was of a neglectful handsomness: For his Hair curled naturally, and was yellow; yet they say there was something stern in his countenance'
The thing is many written records are hard to say for sure is 100% accurate, if historians have visual representations, those are more likely to be accurate. And also given the area, he would more likely have darker hair. The description you shown sounds a little more dramatized, perhaps based on his "son of zeus" idea.
@@EM-vw7imbut what kind of argument is that? We have no other documentation stating his hair color. So you’d rather go off of “Yeah, but that sounds dumb and I personally believe this makes more sense” rather than the only written source describing the man? Ancient sources aren’t always the most reliable, but they’re often the only thing we have, and this isn’t even an instance of describing smg we know cannot be true (like giant gold-hoarding ants); are you sure you paid attention in history class? Also, keep in mind that the Macedonians were some of the northernmost Hellenic peoples, so it makes sense that they wouldn’t all have that traditional Mediterranean look (not that modern Greeks are 1:1 what ancient Greeks might’ve looked like, there’s been a lot of cultural mingling over the past two millennia).
@@EM-vw7im Uhm. No. Back then, there were a lot of fair-skinned, blonde or red-haired, Germanic looking people in Greece. With red beards. There's a reason Homer described them as such. Because Germanic people migrated to Greece, sometime between the Mycenean and Classical period, and partially drove out the natives. The Spartan upper class was definitely light skinned and genetically distinct from the lower strata which they ruled over. There are similar references of people from Thebes, and pretty much everywhere else except Athens. Greek people back then didnt look like they do now after 500 years of intermingling with the Ottomans. Sicilians also dont look like ancient Italians because of, among others, the Carthaginians and the Moors invading. In northern Italy you can still find plenty of blonde people though.
To be fair to Netlfix this really seems like someone was trying to get at least some stuff right, like Alexander wearing armor that looks actually functional and possible for the time, and I think everything that was said was close enough to what happened such as the myth of Alexander's paternity. Which is vastly better then Cleopatra where they said there was no Rome without Egypt and depicted her as a warrior.
"Is that a sarissa in my pocket or am I just pleased to see you?"- The average Macedonian soldier to everything that moved between the Indus and the Levant.
How does fate zero anime series ( the same anime that depicts king arthur as a girl lol 🤣) got the bright colours of Alexander's armies armour right lol 🤣🤣
I mean Cleopatra was Macedonian idk wtf Netflix is doing lately. I love history with a passion and even as a black man I don’t need it black washed. There’s plenty of black and African people who have fantastic stories but screw them I guess ffs Netflix
@@TheSuperappelflap one of the rare things they got at least partially right - Alexander was bisexual, homosexuality was widely accepted in ancient Greece. It wasn't unusual for say, a Greek merchant from Athens to have a wife for procreation and a boyfriend for fun.
By the looks of it the plan was to make the Collin Farrell movie look like a documentary in comparison. That did seem to at least make more of an effort with the battle tactics.
At least this Alexander isn't black... hopefully.... last time I checked he wasn't. And alas, the beard thing is a sore spot for me: it doesn't grow well beyond a certain length :(
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Classical-age Persians wearing turbans is like having Richard The Lionheart wearing a Victorian top hat.
Whatever disgust one feels for the mullahs, one is encouraged to feel about the historical Persians too.
The cringe.
The disrespect.
The incompetence on behalf of Nflix.
Reality is the greatest comedy sometimes!
@@rustomkanishkaHistoric Persians were fairly nice as ancient societies go. How are they comparable to modern day despotic Iranian religious clerics?
If anything, the Greeks are a better fit considering how often autocratic they were.
@@tylersmith3139 Ancient Persian rulers were despots. Their actions were little better than modern despots.
@@benjalucian1515 Weren't most monarchs throughout history despots?
I’m fairly sure Netflix has a team dedicated to canceling good shows
no just a woke team dedicated to destroying written history.
@@sickbozo8152Bro did not just say woke unironically. 💀
@@sickbozo8152isn’t that what conservatives do whenever anyone ask them what the civil war was about?
@@sickbozo8152man mfs use woke far too much
@@anthonyramirez9925the democrats were the south. They were the ones who were trying to promote and keep slavery as it was.
What Netflix is doing is a "Loosely Based On A Story Inspired By Historical Events (Which Came To Me In A Dream)". I have no confidence in them making a show that is a)good, b)accurate and c)not "for a modern audience".
It's like what they do to video game shows. Like halo. So sad
Don't forget "my grandma told me so".
It's a corporation that decided at some point to have a checklist, like companies going "Green". The quality doesn't matter, the results and intent don't even matter, the checklist matters. Follow the checklist.
There is no greater stealth insult than Netflix making things dumber and then saying it's for modern audiences.
Some of their documentaries involving ww2 are good and accurate. Like with "Hitler's Circle of Evil" for example is a great documentary that tells of the men who composed of Hitler's inner circle. They have actors who look the roles, their acting is great, the narration and dialogue is great with historians who are great at giving out the information.
So its not all bad at Netflix when it comes to historical documentaries
Historically inaccurate fashion, hair, makeup, & shoes are a huge pet peeve of mine. Imagine studying 1920s fashion for years, then being invited to photograph a Jazz Age party where you can't find a single good costume, so you have to bribe them to do better the next year by offering threr $100 prizes for most historically accurate outfit.
Well ancient discriptions actually say he is blonde and even his hair color in the mosaic(that could've been a artistic interpretation) is dirty blonde(I didn't name the hair color) so I don't think that part is wrong the helmets are a missed opportunity and the bracers are just another Hollywood eyeroll
Now imagine the winner is wearing crocs .
I thought he was blonde. Idk what you guys are talking about
@@sickzappybeef9209 You also thought he looked like Collin Farel?
@@sickzappybeef9209I think they meant hair style not hair color
I just realized that the armor that Darius is wearing is the same one the they used in Vikings for rollo
O my goodness! It is!
Yeah. It’s leather lamellar armor that makes zero sense
It speaks volumes when Oliver Stone’s ‘2004 alexander’ is more accurate than a documentary.
For everything bad about oliver stone he still is a hell of a movie maker.
That movie was such a decent attempt at a movie showing the life of Alexander. I think a GoT style show would also work really well with Alexander's life and then the Wars of the Successors.
I loved that film, but the non linear format made it a confusing mess.
I can't believe I want to rewatch that after this... thing. It's not bad, but my brain just never screamed "You need to see it again!"
I like Colin Farrell as an actor but he does NOT fit the role of Alexander the Great at all.
Greek here. At this point we have gotten used to our history getting screwed by hollywood. All in the name of viewership and whatever....
Please sue them or convince your northern neighbors too
@@JohnFreyholtz sue them for what? making low quality products? better idea is for the greeks to showcase their own history with their own movies/documentaries/series.
Wasn't Alexander Macedonian?
It must be so annoying!
@@rsmaczny9694 yea kinda a mix
Never underestimate Netfix's dedication to fucking up history
Oh we definitely want a break down of Alexander. In fact, you could say we are... braced for it.
Everyone:finally the dumb black cleopatra drama is over.
Netflix: were doing a sequel.
*Prequel
I get the feeling they saw the backlash from black cleopatra and decided to over correct. Now the got a blond haired, blue eyed guy to play him m
I intentionally avoid watching things that are designed to get people to watch it just so they can complain about how bad it was. The best thing we could have done regarding the Velma show was just ignore it.
Obviously we couldn't do that with Blackpatra because that was actively spreading an intentionally incorrect version of history in order to pander to, I don't know exactly, dumb people who hate racism but also have unexamined racist assumptions? Because everytime I saw an interaction between a critique of Blackpatra versus a defense the critique was always citing the mountains of evidence that Cleopatra was Greek and the defenders just went "Egypt is in Africa, therefore Cleopatra was black."
awwwwwww shit
@@OsirisLord I hadn't realized about the hypocrisy until you mentioned it, the defenders call the people who don't like it racist, while their mindset and defense of it is extremely racist lmao
One of the things that irks me about bracers is that Phillip and Alexander based some of their cavalry reforms on Xenophon's horsemanship manual where among other pieces of equip he suggested that riders wear a forearm guard on the reign arm.
This was the one piece of equipment that the Macedonians did not adopt.
Utter nonsense. The cavalry reforms included each unit fighting in their own formations. Alexander had 12 different cavalry units like companions, Thessalians, Thracians, mounted javlinemen, paeonians, greek allied cavalry, heavy lancers, scythian horse archers, arachosians, indians, sogdians etc.
@@okenogamer well going into the invasion Alexander had far fewer, of which the Companions, Thessalians, Podromoi, and Thracians did not wear forearm guards. Maybe, possibly, some of the Greek mercenaries or allies could have, but there is no evidence for it.
@@tonlito22 im not talking about forearm guard. Im talking about tactical formations of his cavalry units that has nothing to do with Xenophon. Furthermore by the time he reached cilicia he already had lancers with him
11:30 that leather armor would also be a pain to put on, with the buckles being over your kidneys.
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24:00 Obviously, those are not Persians, they're Redguard soldiers.
"Curved...swords."
"they're middle eastern? Give them turbans and scimitars or our audience might be confused"
Nothing makes me angrier than two facts about Netflix.
1) Inside Job got canceled but Big Mouth gets to have 8 seasons.
2) There are all these actual stories about African queens people have never heard about and will probably never experience because Netflix catastrophically fucked up the most basic African Queen imaginable. Tausret? Hatshepsut? Nerftiti? Who the fuck are they? Let's take the only Egyptian queen famous for not being Egyptian and make her black. Oh people didn't like this, okay no more African history since apparently people don't care about it.
even Tausret or Hatshepsut probably wouldnt have been subsaharan. iirc Cleopatra also portayed native egyptians with dreases and hair styles etc. from subsaharan people.
I think a lot of people do know who Hatshepsut and Nefertiti are. At least if you have a mild interest in Egyptology. Which a lot of people do.
I dont think it is a good topic for a documentary series though. Yes, Egypt was ruled by women, for like a couple years out of 6000 years of history. Big deal. I think most people are kind of fed up with the girl boss narratives these days. Even if they were capable of making a good documentary, it still wouldn't do well.
Screwing over Alexander though, I take that personally.
And people are also tired of the male boss as well as people who are snowflakes like you.@@TheSuperappelflap
@@undertakernumberone1 Yeah the Wikipedia article on the Libu has great archeological evidence that native Egyptians weren't white but also weren't black. There's Egyptian artwork on the article that features a line of men. The Egyptian man is brown, then there's a white skinned Assyrian, then a black skinned Nubian, and then four white skinned Libu men. Where were the Libu from? Libya, also in Africa.
@TheSuperappelflap if you're going for Egyptian girl bosses than maybe don't pick the "queen" who sold her nation's sovereignty over to Rome in exchange for sex.
To be fair: Afaik the only source that claims Alexander had heterochromia is Plutarch who lived centuries after Alexanders death.
So that could be a made-up characteristic, possibly done to paint Alexander as someone marked by the gods and destined for greatness.
Netflix has a problem with presenting documentaries with so many inaccurate or even made up facts.
No wonder so many people have so much wrong information about history.
I understand when is a movie, artistic licence ment to entertain, but when you present it to a documentary, you should at least try to be accurate to historic facts.
Yeah. They really need to but that’s just media as a whole. Most “historical” films suffer from that, not just Netflix movies.
Considering one of the exec's dads is an ancient Atlantis theorist...
they're not the only ones though, lest we forget the HIstory channel made Ancient Aliens hahahahhahahhahaha
@@richmondvand147 And the show Vikings... Never let them forger that
"You see those warriors from Persia? They’ve got curved swords. Curved. Swords."
Best ever
The Alexander movie had a professor take an active role in the making of the movie. It's the most accurate historical movie in regards to how people fought back then. And it's literally on Alexander, Gaugamela etc. They could have at least referred to that.
I'd recommend it to anyone who wants to see the closest thing we have to an accurate depiction of how battles would have looked back then.
22:30 To give Netflix much more benefit of the doubt than they have previously (and I expect will prospectively) earned, the spears that are longer than the wielder but not as long as the sarissa might belong to the hypaspsists, a sort of specialized infantry that covered the flanks of the sarissa armed phalangites. The hypaspsists were themselves often covered by flanking cavalry so the shot you reference could feasibly depict the edge of a battleline accurately.
Well, Alexander being blonde is actually one of the few things they got right. The only historical description we have of his hair describes it as “yellow” and/or “like a lion’s mane,” and it predates the mosaic in Pompey (which one I guess could argue to be a dirty blonde, I dunno). As a historian, I thought you’d be up to snuff with that sort of thing…
I was going to post the same thing. Furthermore contemporary sources tended to call him light eyed, usually refering to grey or blue eyes. He is only depicted as having heterochromia in the Alexander Romance over 600 years later.
Mosaics in Pompeii need to be taken with a grain of salt. Some of the pigments in the murals changed color all together from the heat.
He was described as having Tawny hair not Yellow. Have you seen a lions mane? It's not yellow and is usually the darkest fur on a lions body so Alexander was most likely a dark dirty blond.
@@kristiannicholson5893just looking at Google Images and this website shows lion's manes as yellow, only the oldest ones have dark fringes or all black.
It's hilarious that so many Content creators are criticizing Netflix for something they did right for once. It's clear that many people don't do their research and read the primary sources that describe Alex's physical appearance. Instead, they just base their claims on the famous Roman Alexander mosaic while not looking at the Macedonian frescoes, which depict Alex with strawberry blond hair. For instance, according to Brett Cooper, who commented on Netflix Alexander, Alexander the Great was too Anglo-looking and should've been portrayed as a dark Mediterranean, given his Greek heritage. She is unaware that blonde hair and pale complexions were common in Macedonia, Greece's northernmost region.
Of course, most Greeks would have looked like George Clooney or Colin Farell with their natural dark hair, but Alex was pale and blond or red-blonde.
They had a Mural copy they made of that on my Middle School hallway. It was always badass to walk down the hall and see ol Alexander in all his glory lol
Depiction of persians is so unaccurate it's funny
300 did a much better job unironically. XD
No... They were way worse than this at least the Persians and Greeks have colour on their clothers. And use shields like shields. @@OnlyDeathIsEternal
We kinda got used to it😂😂
Alexander brought his own sculpter along with his army so he could take "selfies" on campaign.
Just imagine: a few thousand years from now someone could be legit make a series depicting the Battle of Gettysburg. But Robert E. Lee has a Death Star sittin in the background and everyone is driving around in humvees whacking eachother with pool noodles.
If they’d done that with this people might actually enjoy it more 😆
They sure got stirrups early in history. I'm just glad they didn't show a bunch of archers with 10lb bows that sent out wobbling arrows. But at least they had the dude leaping into battle.
I mean, stirrups are a right bugger to get in a show, there's insurance, training for both actors and horses, it just makes things a lot harder and can even be outright impossible depending on the studio and even laws depending on where its filmed. Almost no movie, show or series has stirrupless horses, even ones that are in all other aspects very good.
I mean the light infantry used slings.....
@@isaacnickel Netflix exec: "but but but slings arent pointy and sexy!!!!"
It's actually offensive how Netflix seems to go out of it's way to be as historically inaccurate as humanely possible. How do they even manage it? I genuinely cannot understand, it's not like it would hard to have the costume department study this matter for 15 minutes and realize how stupid all the designs are....
I’m calling it: Their next one is going to be about Hadrian.
I am surpised they haven't done Zenobia yet
Or boudicca it seems like something they'd be dumb enough to screw up
@@swiggityswank9459 Oh jeez, I hadn't even thought of her!
No no the next one is gonna be about a black septimus because he was born in africa
At this point I'm amazed the persian shields have Zoroastrian symbols on them and not the crescent and star.
I forget what it was, but I watched a show depicting Alexander's battle against the Persian leader. It stayed at a fairly high camera level and only came down to emphasize certain decisions/actions by Alexander or the Persian lord. Despite the dramatic depiction, at least it kept the soldiers in formation and had the Macedonians stay in formation when clashing with the Iranians (also in formation).
The main downside I remember from this ancient video is that there weren't any archers.
Netflix meme “how many times do we have to teach you this lesson old man“😂
Morgan Freeman: Stakuyi would come to find that, in fact, it did not appease the TH-cam God's.
Blindly charging into the enemy without formations is definitely an accurate representation of how an army that changed the world under a commander who would be renown throughout history as one of the greatest generals of all time fought. Definitely. Tactics and strategy are for people who lack military greatness. (Yes mostly just commenting to comment for the algorithm).
Formations are for nerds. Real Chads just run at the enemy like theyre an extra in Braveheart.
On the topic of cavalry spears, a little known fact is that the spears were tipped at both ends so that if one end broke off they could simply turn it around.
Just wait till Alexander rides in wearing his viking studded doublebracers and fielding his M60 machinegun, that's going to be a wild scene.
27:05 those scimitars look like they're literal wooden cutouts and they haven't even bothered putting on some semblance of an edge on them.
Considering how big part of overall budget for historical/fantasy series is the costume and prop departments, and how big budgets we are talking about in few years past.... I am really surprised that we dont see in news some scandals regarding embezzlements, IRS raids, outright stealing. Dunno where did the money go, but for sure not into costumes and props.
I remember my grandmother saying to me "I don't care what they tell you in school, Alexander was black....and they all wore bracers"
Phillip crawled, walked and ran so Alexander could fly.
Stacked Cookies channeling my pained historian noises for this. They didn't even *try* with this one, it's getting depressing at this point. Not to mention obviously catering to the current regime in Tehran in the depiction of the Persians.
They don't look very Persian to me, mate.
At this point? Mate, Netflix has been doing this for years.
Tbf about the hair colour....he has multiple times been described as "Xanthos" wich means blonde in greek even to day and in roman Xathos was not someone with very light brown hair (thats ehat they called blonde ) but someone with light yellowish hair.
The worst part is we have a movie already that was fairly accurate in its depiction of Alexander the Great. One that was made in 2004. (Unless I'm confusing it with the 1956 one)
I don't think I would've wanted Netflix to make it, but a show about empress Taytu of Ethiopia would be great, and if you're trying to show times when African queens did great things she's right up thay alley. During her husband's reign, he may have been the one technically in charge but he was only so effective because it was the 2 of them working together, equally important. And as he got weaker, and then for a while after he died, she was the single most powerful person in all of Ethiopia, more so than the emperors.
You can move through the paused video frame-by-frame by pressing the < and > keys.
We even have a recreation of Philip II, he had a beard and one working eye. Who’s this clean shaven dude, that’s not Alexander’s father
I watched a video a few years ago, likely here on YT, in which a guy created a set of Linothorax armor via the same general method they reportedly did so back then. Many layers of strong linen glued together and left to cure/harden. It was shockingly hard and effective at stopping stabs and arrows from puncturing through once it was ready. Very informative, recommend a look.
Unfortunately I've seen some references off-handedly refer to linothorax armor simply as a "linen armor" or "layered linen" in a shorthand comment. Which doesn't quite get across how strong that armor was due to the resulting effect of it's composite make-up. I think some people take the simplified "linen armor" statement to incorrectly mean that they were just thick plain cloth or, as in this docu-drama's case, padded/stuffed linen gambesons. Which is a sad misunderstanding and doesn't convey how ingenious and effective linothorax was for the time.
Ahem... guys... Bracers? Check 22:26
Looks to me like the Macedonians are using stirrups. In 331 BC.
And maybe that's because it's already difficult to find people willing to ride a horse with stirrups, let alone without. But in HBO's Rome, they taught the actors to ride the horse without stirrups...
I can't believe we can now look back on what was considered a bad movie and think man that was so much better.
You should check out the Hard Core History Addendum episode 9 "Glimpses of Olympia". Dan goes into some of history and lore surrounding Alexander's mother. Woman was something else.
A true historian. The water are currently rising up his legs and he decide the important matter at hand is to ramble about Netflix
Love your vids man!
Bracer exists in this time. But why is no one pissed off saddle stirrups? This was created like 500 years later. This was total revolution.
Because people generally accept strirrups as a technical limitation. It would be too big of a hassle, due to insurance/liability/training to not use them.
Because nobody can ride these days without stirrups.
Oliver Stone’s Alexander addressed that issue in a pretty innovative way. They definitely had stirrups, but they pared them right back to the bare minimum to be function and made them of clear material so that it was quite to see them, giving the appearance of not having them in the first place.
Netflix could easily have done something similar, though that could be said about pretty much everything in this travesty of a show
At a Netflix producers' meeting:
"I still can't believe how much backlash we got on the Cleopatra series."
"Do you think that means we need to do a better job with the historical research the next time around? Or maybe even just go for historical fiction instead of trying to do a documentary?
"What the heck does that have to do with anything?"
"Yeah. There's only one possible explanation for why our last series wasn't a hit."
"Exactly. It's because everybody that didn't like it is a racist."
"Ok, so how about this. For our next series, let's make whoever we pick as a main character into a blue-eyed blonde."
"Brilliant! That's obviously what audiences care about more than anything. We can't lose!"
*Netflix's Alexander the Great receives backlash over glaring historical inaccuracies.*
Next meeting:
"I don't get it! What is wrong with these people??"
If my memory is right the sarissa's were 16 feet long. Alex's innovation being to let the guys further back attack from safety making them mor eenthusiastic and safe while the front formed an unbreakable shield wall.
Netflix is all about "the message."
I’m surprised that you didn’t mention the stirrups seen with the cavalry. Alexander and his companion cavalry did not have saddles as we know them nor stirrups.
The only historian involved was some unpaid intern who was instructed on what Things He should Look Up on Wikipedia, and told Not to offer any other Suggestions or corrections.
My grandmother always told me : "I don't care what people tell you, Alexander was a Smurf !"
I just love how Persians who lived almost 800 years before the Arab invasion are using turbans and curved swords.
Thing that hurts my brain is, the cavalry have stirrups! Companion cavalry didn't have that 😭
Imagine charging full tilt into the enemy with both hands on your spear and no stirrups to platform. The thighs on those men must have been magnificient
From what we know historically, this is one of the greatest story's in history. Instead of telling us this amazing tale Netflix once again thinks they can do better...
I would actually love to see you reviewing a well made Docudrama, like HBO's Band of Brothers, which is pretty accurate depiction of historical events based on the recollection of soldiers that served in 101st airborne. Because that is an example of how such show should be done, and could be done well.
You know, just to see a bit of positivity, maybe :D
Turbans are there bcs netflix thinks that audience in the US of A is too dumb to figure out this is going on in the Middle East without visual aid (turbans, scimitars) stereotypically associated with that area and to hell with historical accuracy. As for battle formations, I guess they thought fighting in formation isn't as sexy as gladiator style 1v1 meelee. That's the same reason why Netflix Alex is blonde with blue eyes. Completely idiotic.
Yeah. Not even going to bother. I canceled Netflix months ago. Idgaf how much I love Altered Carbon. Time to sail the high seas.
you’re taking up a new hobby of sailing instead of binge watching tv? very smart. might try it
@@historyofeverythingpodcastSailing can be rough, I recommend a good gardening hobby on the side, with lots of seeding, and help from peers.
Why dont you just torrent everything??? its free
Anyone wanna join my piyrate cult?
@@historyofeverythingpodcast sorta kinda. Landlocked lake via a data stream ;)
They made it seem like he didnt know what he was doing and all came to him with just strokes of luck.
To answer your opening question: Netflix knows cable is dying, but also knows the most people kept cable to watch daytime TV (history channel, baking shows, W network, lifetime, hallmark, etc.) So they've put A LOT of money into stealing that market away from cable as they also know thats what most of their audience watches. Sadly, the majority of people use TV as white noise to drown out their thoughts while they do menial house labour, or at the end of the long day. So Netflix primarly makes what use to be called 'boob tv' (terrible name with misogynistic connotations, but is what it is) in order to keep these subscribers that only watch trash TV.
In short: Netflix has taken the torch from The History Channel with these series. Its not about making historically accurate programs, its about making easy to digest, in-offensive, tell the audience what they already know with cheap enactments, to keep them engaged while they do their chores, work, or eat diner after a long day. Netflix doesn't give a flying fuck about their subscribers or the quality of the content they put out. They only care about viewer counts, so if these dumbass "history" shows bring the viewer counts then they'll keep pumping em out the exact same way that the History Channel used to do for decades. It's mindless garbage, it's supposed to be mindless garbage, and unfortunately we the consumers let it happen and are to blame for it.
If we want quality we have to put out money and attention towards it. This means not watching crap like these documentaries and watching the shows and films of quality. Quality is subjective, sure fair enough, and using critics ratings isn't always the answer. But a mixture of critic recommendations from people you trust, friend and family recommendations, plus just a little but of risk and reward - literally just trying things at random and seeing if you'll like it, rather than choosing the safe choice or whatever the "top 10" throws at you - will give better rewards and will stop this garbage from being made.
Want better art? Support better art. Want Netflix to stop producing garbage? Then stop watching it (Except you HoEP, but we all love when you rip to shreds this trash, but for the rest of us, stop giving netflix viewer counts for shit)
History shows used to BE history shows.
Now they're "History, the CW version we filmed with a budget of twelve dollars."
Um bud it's not a misogynistic phrase it's just a variant of the idiot box ie it's TV for foolish or stupid people not to do with women
But the thing is. People arent watching these shows. Of course Netflix doesnt release numbers but we all know that more people watched youtube videos about that Cleopatra show than people actually watched it.
It doesnt matter to Netflix, they will keep making this type of content. Because rewriting history is what they want to do. And this company has barely made any profit since it was conceived, and has lost billions of dollars. They dont care about the money. Its about sending the message.
The drabness of the armor of the first photo might be the armor just being covered in dirt and dust from a long march depending on when it takes place in his campaigns, (not sure haven't seen it yet) and maybe still be colorful underneath. But that's probably giving Netflix a little to much credit.
Does this mean we owe Oliver stone an apology?
Who?
I mean his movie is fairly faithfully historically accurate but it's also dreadfully boring
@primarchvulkan5097 And most of the performances are bad in one way or another
Honestly at first glance I was confused because I thought he was fighting middle eastern/ Ottoman troops from the helmets alone. (No im not referring to janissaries) Which is quite a long time off.
Netflix ain't hitting anymore.
when did Netflix hit?
@@silentstorm5439 Like 8 years ago
I want to believe the reason they used the wrong Persian helmets is due to not wanting to cover up the actors' faces, but it's probably just them not caring.
I’m just peeved that the show stopped season 4 of the show ‘The Roman Empire’ to make season 1 of this show
I liked the miniseries…I saw it in 2004 and it starred Colin Farrell and Angelina Jolie!
You know it's pretty hilarious that Netflix is blaming the failure of it's other docu-dramas on bigotry meanwhile their costume department is apparently going "Persia. That's in the Middle-East right? Yeah they definitely all wore turbans over there."
It's pretty sad that Netflix is well on their way to making a less historically accurate version of Alexander the Great's story than the Colin Farrell one.
If I recall, I read that there is no historical documentation from Alexander's time that he had heterochromia. The Alexander Romance is more fiction than historical.
Thank you for pumping out high quality long form videos that make work go by faster
I bet the color is a deliberate choice to make it easier to CGI the 'army' in.
The spear was a great innovation at the time - I remember rading they were fragile too if not used right. :)
One of Rome's generals (Pompey the Great maybie?) really wanted Alexanders long curly locks. So at least the Romans thought he had long hair.
Perhaps the leather is for the Persians light conscript forces?
I always thought Alexander didnt believe in the god thing at first but the 'prophets' kept feeding him poisoned words till he lost his mind and thought it was real.
Netflix didnt learn from the racism they had before.
"The spear was a great innovation at the time"
What? The spear is probably the oldest weapon of history, if we consider choppers like tools and not weapons, how is it an innovation? XD
Unless you mean the Sarissa, in that case, yeah it's an innovation, but it's more the tactics and formations that are the innovation ^^
"Perhaps the leather is for the Persians light conscript forces? "
I'm pretty sure leather is more expensive than cloth XD
@@krankarvolund7771I think he means the specific spears (I forget the name) that Alexander's army used
@@Tr33ba1tPikes. Sarissa is the name
At 13:00 not only did Philip create the Macedonian war machine but he also conquered Greece. And then Alexander had to spend 2 years reconquering it which probably should have been mentioned in the Netflix show.
The Macedonians would be like barbarian Scotland conquering England then going on to defeat Europe, so worth a mention.
Philip didn't conquer Greece, the Macedonians identified as Greeks themselves and considered Greece their mother country. Therefore the intention of Philip was to bring stability to Greece and NOT to conquer what he considered his mother country, he was anxious to pacify the warring states in the south of Greece as a prelude to uniting Greece. Philip thus created the Pan-Hellenic league or league of Greek and only Greek states with Macedonia as the Leading Greek state and Philip himslelf as HEGEMON or leader of the Greeks..
Philip did NOT conquer Greece. Philip considered Greece the mother country, why would he conquer his own mother country. Philip created the PAN-HELLENIC LEAGUE or league of Greek and only Greek states with Macedonia as the leading Greek state and Philip himself as ruller of all the Greeks. It was literally a unification of Greece by Philip into an imperial Greece.
And somehow the most accurate depiction of phalanx combat remains Zack Snyder's "300".
Worst Greek Armour but really good Greek tactics. Such a fun movie lol
This made me sad
No, it was that other Alexander movie 20 years ago
Best docu-drama I have ever seen, was 'Nancy Wake: The White Mouse'- it was well-told, artistic without being gratuitous, & I finished it feeling elevated by the viewing, & wanting to know more about her- I *didn't* spend my time banging my head against my desk, wondering what the hell they doing- why they were changing WWII history & figures.
This isn't rocket-science: the formula to good entertainment, that's also informative - is to make good entertainment, that's also informative...
Nit gonna lie i was waiting for Netflix to pull a ‘Everyone knows Alexander was Korean’
Everyone to Oliver Stone's Alexander: "Perhaps we treated you too harshly".
The real question is "How gay will Alexander be?"
Safe bet to assume "less than he probably was given the culture he was from."
The literal first scene with him includes him and his gay lover.
Considering how very gay he was, they can only mess that part up by making him straight and calling Patroclus his 'best friend'
@@Gluckdrache That's Achilles but I take your point. Personally I'll be interested to see if they mention his reported attraction to young boys and eunuchs. If memory serves those reports come from the same source (Dicaearchus) that tells us about his relationship with Hephaestion. The show is a great opportunity to talk about ancient attitudes towards sex and attraction in a grown-up forum: I look forward to them inevitably putting their foot in it.
Clearly they were just good friends and roommates 👍
This is so accurate to history because we all know that people were stupid and suicidal back in the days, it's not like they had something to come back to like loved ones right?
Netflix is being Netflix. There's not much on there to remain subscribed for.
I dropped it when they demanded to be separated from our package.
@@madtabby66 I've gone back to DVDs and cable. Don't really miss Netflix.
One of the things that worries me is that this trailer seems to insinuate that Alexander invaded Persia due to his father's assassination, when in reality Alexander was merely taking over an invasion that had already begun under Phillip.
Let's just call it what it really is. Netflix is doing mockumentaries.
Netflix getting anything accurate? is like expecting a liar to ever tell the truth. It can happen. But 99% of the time no
There is historical record stating Alexander had hair the colour of fire, or a lions mane. In other words, blonde!
'"They say that the most amiable and beautiful amongst the Greeks was Alcibiades; amongst the Romans, Scipio. It is reported also that Demetrius Poliorcetes contended in Beauty. They affirm likewise that Alexander Son of Philip was of a neglectful handsomness: For his Hair curled naturally, and was yellow; yet they say there was something stern in his countenance'
The thing is many written records are hard to say for sure is 100% accurate, if historians have visual representations, those are more likely to be accurate. And also given the area, he would more likely have darker hair. The description you shown sounds a little more dramatized, perhaps based on his "son of zeus" idea.
@@EM-vw7imbut what kind of argument is that? We have no other documentation stating his hair color. So you’d rather go off of “Yeah, but that sounds dumb and I personally believe this makes more sense” rather than the only written source describing the man? Ancient sources aren’t always the most reliable, but they’re often the only thing we have, and this isn’t even an instance of describing smg we know cannot be true (like giant gold-hoarding ants); are you sure you paid attention in history class?
Also, keep in mind that the Macedonians were some of the northernmost Hellenic peoples, so it makes sense that they wouldn’t all have that traditional Mediterranean look (not that modern Greeks are 1:1 what ancient Greeks might’ve looked like, there’s been a lot of cultural mingling over the past two millennia).
@@EM-vw7im Uhm. No. Back then, there were a lot of fair-skinned, blonde or red-haired, Germanic looking people in Greece. With red beards. There's a reason Homer described them as such. Because Germanic people migrated to Greece, sometime between the Mycenean and Classical period, and partially drove out the natives. The Spartan upper class was definitely light skinned and genetically distinct from the lower strata which they ruled over. There are similar references of people from Thebes, and pretty much everywhere else except Athens.
Greek people back then didnt look like they do now after 500 years of intermingling with the Ottomans. Sicilians also dont look like ancient Italians because of, among others, the Carthaginians and the Moors invading. In northern Italy you can still find plenty of blonde people though.
@@EM-vw7im You familiar with how people research right? Reading records , documents, and such is a thing!
Wonder Woman and Batman: wear bracers
Media producers: we need more bracers
Well, i kinda half surprised he isnt portrayed by a aboriginal woman.
To be fair to Netlfix this really seems like someone was trying to get at least some stuff right, like Alexander wearing armor that looks actually functional and possible for the time, and I think everything that was said was close enough to what happened such as the myth of Alexander's paternity. Which is vastly better then Cleopatra where they said there was no Rome without Egypt and depicted her as a warrior.
"Is that a sarissa in my pocket or am I just pleased to see you?"- The average Macedonian soldier to everything that moved between the Indus and the Levant.
I am still laughing
Netflix may as well given us a flying carpet as well to depict the Persian Cavalry.
How does fate zero anime series ( the same anime that depicts king arthur as a girl lol 🤣) got the bright colours of Alexander's armies armour right lol 🤣🤣
Because the people making the "docuramas" are edgy teens.
"PULLO, FORMATION!!!"
-me, whenever I see a Hollywood melee
Alexander had hetreochromia? That explains so much, he was an OC, do not steal.
I mean Cleopatra was Macedonian idk wtf Netflix is doing lately. I love history with a passion and even as a black man I don’t need it black washed. There’s plenty of black and African people who have fantastic stories but screw them I guess ffs Netflix
Netflix? Must mean that it'll be 90% about his boytoys.
Anyway, they seem to have reused props left over from some Saladin or Crusader "docudrama".
Apparently it took them all of 8 minutes to make him extremely gay
@@TheSuperappelflap one of the rare things they got at least partially right - Alexander was bisexual, homosexuality was widely accepted in ancient Greece. It wasn't unusual for say, a Greek merchant from Athens to have a wife for procreation and a boyfriend for fun.
@@FidelisRaven they didnt get it partly right. He was probably bi. they made him gay.
@@TheSuperappelflap That's why I said "partly" ;)
By the looks of it the plan was to make the Collin Farrell movie look like a documentary in comparison. That did seem to at least make more of an effort with the battle tactics.
At least this Alexander isn't black... hopefully.... last time I checked he wasn't. And alas, the beard thing is a sore spot for me: it doesn't grow well beyond a certain length :(
I can't even grow one😢