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Good historical documentaries?

Goo Punch

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Goo Punch

Goo Punch 4275

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I'm looking for anything historical here: the roman empire, vikings, ancient china and japan,  mesopotamia, anything historical that's available on netflix, hulu, prime, etc. currently watching something on English castles on netflix and i have a bigger itch to scratch now.

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SimonBolivar

SimonBolivar 10958

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For 19th and 20th centuries

 

Ken Burn's The Civil War is streaming, but I can't remember where.

BBC's The Great War (1960 something) is on youtube and it's excellent.

World at War is always fun, but not sure where it's streaming currently

 

Those would keep you busy for months.

 

 

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Go Pokes

Go Pokes 979

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Shit, Ken Burns (and his brother Ric) can keep you busy for months.  He pretty much just focuses American history, so you'll have to find Vikings and Mesopotamia elsewhere.  He delves pretty deeply into each topic, so you learn a shit ton of stuff from each one.   

These are all currently streaming on Nextflix

As mentioned above, The Civil War is excellent as are his docs called The Vietnam War and The War (WWII) 

The West -all about settling the West and how cool the white people were about it.  Makes you fell like shit if you're white.  Actually makes you feel like shit if you're human.  But still great.  

Prohibition (surprisingly interesting and only about 5 hours long)

The Roosevelts (meh, save it for last)

Streaming on Amazon

Baseball ( I know more about the history of baseball than anyone I know and every episode was a learning experience.  Lots of little told stories in this one).  He also did a really good one of Jackie Robinson.  

National Parks- this was great.  May not sound interesting, but it is

The Dust Bowl & Jazz (haven't seen them.  Just not subjects I find interesting)

American Experience:  New York (Ric Burns) - Amazing history of NYC going back to the Dutch.  One of my favorites.  It's  about 16 hours of awesomeness.  

I just noticed a 10 part (50 min each) doc called The First World War that looks more comprehensive than the 6 hour The Great War.  So that's what I'm on to now.  

 

I'll be keeping an eye on this thread for sure.  I'd like to get some recs for some of that ancient shit Goo mentioned in the OP.  Or just anything on European history in general.  

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SimonBolivar

SimonBolivar 10958

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44 minutes ago, Go Pokes said:

Shit, Ken Burns (and his brother Ric) can keep you busy for months.  He pretty much just focuses American history, so you'll have to find Vikings and Mesopotamia elsewhere.  He delves pretty deeply into each topic, so you learn a shit ton of stuff from each one.   

These are all currently streaming on Nextflix

As mentioned above, The Civil War is excellent as are his docs called The Vietnam War and The War (WWII) 

The West -all about settling the West and how cool the white people were about it.  Makes you fell like shit if you're white.  Actually makes you feel like shit if you're human.  But still great.  

Prohibition (surprisingly interesting and only about 5 hours long)

The Roosevelts (meh, save it for last)

Streaming on Amazon

Baseball ( I know more about the history of baseball than anyone I know and every episode was a learning experience.  Lots of little told stories in this one).  He also did a really good one of Jackie Robinson.  

National Parks- this was great.  May not sound interesting, but it is

The Dust Bowl & Jazz (haven't seen them.  Just not subjects I find interesting)

American Experience:  New York (Ric Burns) - Amazing history of NYC going back to the Dutch.  One of my favorites.  It's  about 16 hours of awesomeness.  

I just noticed a 10 part (50 min each) doc called The First World War that looks more comprehensive than the 6 hour The Great War.  So that's what I'm on to now.  

 

I'll be keeping an eye on this thread for sure.  I'd like to get some recs for some of that ancient shit Goo mentioned in the OP.  Or just anything on European history in general.  

I'd rank the Ken Burns one like this...

 

Civil War

National Parks

Vietnam

Baseball

Phohibition

The Dust Bowl

Thomas Jefferson

Huey Long

The War

 

I saw The West and thought it was good but it isn't a true "Ken Burns". You can't go wrong with any of his work and I'm excited for his 2020 release on Hemingway. Oh and the great Coyote vs McCullough vs David narrator debate is one for the ages.

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Go Pokes

Go Pokes 979

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That's about how I'd rank them.  I'd probably have baseball in the top 2 because I grew up an obsessed baseball nerd.  And I'd have The War higher too.  What didn't you like about that one?  

 

I forgot to add, concerning your #1 - avatar checks out.  

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SimonBolivar

SimonBolivar 10958

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8 minutes ago, Go Pokes said:

That's about how I'd rank them.  I'd probably have baseball in the top 2 because I grew up an obsessed baseball nerd.  And I'd have The War higher too.  What didn't you like about that one?  

 

I forgot to add, concerning your #1 - avatar checks out.  

I liked The War much better than ranking it last would make you think. I just like the others that much. 

 

It may be because there have been so many top notch WWII docs out there that I wasn't as excited to watch it as say a long series on the National Parks. I grew up a huge history nerd with it really coming alive in the late 90's. That meant you were watching WWII documentaries on The History Channel all day long.

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Go Pokes

Go Pokes 979

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5 minutes ago, PRONG HORN said:

It's like nobody read the op.

Or perhaps we don't give a shit and we prefer to shove our preferences down his throat in order to create a smarter, better Goo Punch.  

Plus I don't know any good documentaries on any of that shit.  I'm waiting for someone to chime in with those.   I'd like a good documentary on the history of kings and queens of England.  Probably have to be about 75 episodes long though.  

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Go Pokes

Go Pokes 979

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15 minutes ago, SimonBolivar said:

I liked The War much better than ranking it last would make you think. I just like the others that much. 

 

It may be because there have been so many top notch WWII docs out there that I wasn't as excited to watch it as say a long series on the National Parks. I grew up a huge history nerd with it really coming alive in the late 90's. That meant you were watching WWII documentaries on The History Channel all day long.

That's a good point.  We'll never run out of material on WWII thanks to the Nazis.  I bet they thought they were documenting the next great empire for all of history to study.  Instead they just documented what monsters they were.  Kind of a funny joke on them.  

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SimonBolivar

SimonBolivar 10958

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13 minutes ago, Go Pokes said:

  I'd like a good documentary on the history of kings and queens of England.  Probably have to be about 75 episodes long though.  

giphy.gif

 

In keeping with non American history there is a good doc on Shakespeare on Amazon Prime called In Search of Shakespeare. There's also a documentary on there with each episode done by a famous actor about an individual Shakespeare play called Shakespeare Uncovered.

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OWLVIS

OWLVIS 557

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5 hours ago, Go Pokes said:

Shit, Ken Burns (and his brother Ric) can keep you busy for months.  He pretty much just focuses American history, so you'll have to find Vikings and Mesopotamia elsewhere.  He delves pretty deeply into each topic, so you learn a shit ton of stuff from each one.   

 

Baseball ( I know more about the history of baseball than anyone I know and every episode was a learning experience.  Lots of little told stories in this one).  He also did a really good one of Jackie Robinson.  

 

2

swing and a miss on Ty Cobb though

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Dutch

Dutch 4472

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Netflix:

Secrets of the  Tower of London

Secrets of Westminster

Secrets of Great British Castles

Edward VIII, The Nazi King (I found this right after I watched Season Two of The Crown; very well done.)

The Royal House of Windsor (if you like The Crown, you'll really enjoy this).

Edit: I'll second what lateshow said about Armistice and The Long Shadow. Both are very well done. Watch Armistice first, though.

Amazon Prime:

Wolf Hall (not a documentary, but it might as well be.  A BBC/Masterpiece six-episode series set in Tudor England.  It's told from Cromwell's point of view and gives him more sympathetic treatment.  Mark Rylance is utterly brilliant as Cromwell, and Claire Foy (as usual) is outstanding as Anne Bolyen.  I cannot recommend this highly enough.)

Inside the Tower of London

Henry VII: The Winter King

The First World War. Ten episodes, but very deep and insightful.

The  Battle of Chosin.  You must watch this.  What those guys endured...

Carrier.  Ten episode PBS doc following life on the USS Nimitz

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SDG

SDG 3319

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Bump: finding that Netflix keeps reducing their documentary inventory my question is who has the best offerings?  Amazon prime is getting better, but is there a service with a lot to offer?  I’m not religious but have been on a biblical kick as well as crime docs.  Any input is appreciated. 

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atomheartbevo

atomheartbevo 89686

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3 hours ago, SDG said:

Bump: finding that Netflix keeps reducing their documentary inventory my question is who has the best offerings?  Amazon prime is getting better, but is there a service with a lot to offer?  I’m not religious but have been on a biblical kick as well as crime docs.  Any input is appreciated. 

YouTube surprisingly has some really good documentaries that are solo/indie productions.  There are some very slick productions, covering everything from historical accuracies/inaccuracies in movies, to 5-minute history lessons, to a 40+ part series on some dude walking the Little Big Horn battlefield and pointing out where everybody died, where everybody was moving to and from, etc.

Speaking of battlefields, Gettysburg National Military Park has some amazing (walking) documentaries of various parts of the Gettysburg battle, as well as a lot of recorded lectures from their rangers (their rangers aren't typical rangers - many have extensive backgrounds in military history, have published, etc.)

https://www.youtube.com/user/GettysburgNPS/videos

It is extremely easy to get sucked into YouTube for hours if you're into historical stuff.  I think I've watched a few dozen of this guy's videos - he does metal detecting up in Pennsylvania and parts around there, and has found hundreds of Civil War-era bullets, cannonballs, etc.

https://www.youtube.com/user/aquachigger/videos

 

 

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pyrohornIII

pyrohornIII 4815

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This is a good site for at least seeing what kinds of documentaries are out there.   It's tied to netflix, and it works like they used to with DVDs through the mail.  So if you are already a streaming customer, it's like an extra 4 bucks a month to get the DVDs. 

https://dvd.netflix.com/BrowseGenres/Religion-Mythology-Documentaries/2130

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SDG

SDG 3319

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21 minutes ago, pyrohornIII said:

This is a good site for at least seeing what kinds of documentaries are out there.   It's tied to netflix, and it works like they used to with DVDs through the mail.  So if you are already a streaming customer, it's like an extra 4 bucks a month to get the DVDs. 

https://dvd.netflix.com/BrowseGenres/Religion-Mythology-Documentaries/2130

Poss rep, I loved the history channel before it went all pawn stars and counting cars.

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pyrohornIII

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Check out the Marshall documentary on Prime.  It's only an hour, so that is nice.   So many of these history channel type docs are built with a lot of repetition.  Those cliffhanger type questions right before the commercial break and then the recap right after the break, like we have forgotten all that in the space of 3 or 4 minutes.  That shit stretches a 20 minute story into an hour. 

This one isn't like that.

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SDG

SDG 3319

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Has anyone tried Curiositystream.com?  I guess it’s the Netflix for documentaries.  

Quote

Award‑Winning Documentaries & Series, Anytime, Anywhere!

Watch 1,800+ shows worldwide across science, space, technology, nature, history, health and more.

I saw a commercial for it the other day and am thinking about giving it a shot but can’t find any reviews.  

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