The Bible (2013)

This is one of those series that get hit from both sides.

It radicalizes and polarizes both sides on the political spectrum, and the religious spectrum and draws hatred from the fanatics on both sides.

If you read the reviews:

The far right uber-religious are crying about how Biblically inaccurate this is...and that means that they missed the "mini-series" part of production. Really, how are you going to make it accurate to the Bible and watchable for the general public?

I used to work in history and that was a HUGE pet peeve of mine. "Saving Private Ryan would have been good but this, this, and this were inaccurate and..." WHO CARES????!!!!!!!

Do you honestly want an entire two-hour episode of David sitting down writing Psalms? That's really not going to be entertaining. The same goes with long winded rehearsals of who begot whom, which are also guaranteed to put the public to sleep.

If you want a literal interpretation of the book...buy and read the book. Otherwise you will have a faithful depiction at best, but never a truly accurate one.

You can't even translate Harry Potter 100% accurately into a film and those novels are a lot less, well, Biblical. So, chill, take a seat, and be entertained.

The series might be made to educate, but it's education for entertainment as implied by the word "dramatization."

And moving across the alley you have far left fanatics yelling that both the book and this series should be banned. Yelling that they are harmful, that they are dangerous....

...and I guess they are forgetting that people said the exact same things about "Howl" when it was published, and if you live in America and have that view, you should be seriously ashamed of yourself.

There is something inherently wrong about censoring thought and speech. Chill, this is an AMERICAN production and over here, if you want to worship the stick you found in the parking lot last Tuesday...and then make a movie about it, that's your Constitutionally protected right as stated in the 1st Amendment.

If you have an issue with that, move someplace that censors thought, religion, and speech. The rest of us are perfectly happy that we won't get thrown in jail for not sharing the same views as whomever is in power at the moment.

So...if you think about it, if you really think about it, the Bible did a FANTASTIC job in dramatizing the Bible if it's getting it from both sides. The far left is not happy with it and the far right is not happy with it...and that generally means I'm going to be pretty happy with it.

And I was, as someone that spent most of his adult life working around history...well...is there a word that best explains salivating in nerd fueled bliss?

It was awesome. Like The Da Vinci Code (book not movie) the little chapters were just long enough to draw you in and short enough not to get dull. But, the historian in me absolutely loved how well it showed the the stories and people were inter-connected...and that is really an aspect of the Bible that you do NOT get when you go to church.

So you have a bunch of short interconnected stories that sort of turns the Bible into a "Pulp Fiction" styled miniseries and just sits really well for entertainment purposes.

For real entertainment purposes, spending more time on Judges, where you get the bulk of the nation building and the only real stories that you liked when your parents forced you at gunpoint to go to CCD as a child, would have been preferable.

Yeah Moses and Noah are OK, but really you want to hear more about Samson and the high adventure stories...the ones that you liked as a little kid because it read kind of like Robert E. Howard...But I guess focusing only on those stories wouldn't make The Bible as epic in scope as the miniseries became.

And, I feel because of that need to be more epic you had what so many other people complained about...

SAMURAI NINJA WARRIOR VR TROOPER ANGELS

And unlike the political and religious zealot complaints...the Samurai Angels were really a valid complaint. That just hurt to see.

I WOULD have given it 10 stars because it was super entertaining...but Ninja Warrior Angels. You can't suspend your disbelief enough not to do a spit-take when you see them.

They were so bad.

But fortunately they were also short lived.

So...don't turn it off when you see them. It's a good dramatization to sit back and watch, and the strongest part is honestly the length of the little chapters. It makes it perfect for viewing.

I've just finished watching this series and knowing a little of the bible, and by no means enough, I think it was an interesting watch and with it being only 45 minutes per episode was not overly long and heavy, in fact I managed to watch a few of the ten episodes back to back

As for the accuracy, I cannot speak to that as this is not a subject that I am expert on but as far as entertainment this was a must watch for this era and an insight as to the "goings on" in that age. I have actually added it to my "watch again" list as I did find it very good.