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Reviews
Bonanza: Gift of Water (1962)
Connections
Summary: Hoss and Adam find themselves drilling engineers as they develop the world's first rotary drilling rig, predating M.C. and C.E. Baker's 1882 rig in South Dakota.
As noted by other reviewers, the episode is notable for the pairing of Majel Barrett and James Doohan. Barrett in particular is memorable channeling Dorothea Lange's "Migrant Mother" 3 years prior to the first Star Trek pilot "The Cage" in 1965.
Notable too is the teleplay by Borden Chase, who earlier immortalized another desperate drive in "Red River" (1948)."
The Men Who Built America (2012)
Enormously engaging, succeeds in its aspirations
You know the names of the foundations, the musems, the cultural centers; not so much the circumstances of these men who contributed to America as much as any of her Presidents. This series aims to put faces to names, and succeeds in that aspiration memorably. Ideologically, it links innovation, capitalism and the social good as well as anything you're bound to see in the popular media.
The opening titles won me over then and there, demonstrating that this series was something different. it rolled out a sequence of what we thought of as dusty old names and depicted them in 2.5D as rock stars, recalling the opening titles of "Easy Riders Raging Bulls (2003)." High production values are evident all around, from the exceptional CGI recreations to the casting and acting.
At times the production comes across as bit over-the-top, but isn't that appropriate given the outsized subject matter?