crack_van | Fandom Overview: Band of Brothers

Band of Brothers: A Fannish Overview

This story shall the good man teach his son;
And Crispin Crispian shall ne'er go by,
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remember'd;
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother....

--William Shakespeare
Henry V, IV.iii.56-62

The Show

Band of Brothers is an HBO miniseries that follows the real-life World War Two experiences of the soldiers of Easy Company. Easy was one of nine companies in the 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment of the 101st Airborne, and it participated in many of the major campaigns of the war, from jumping into Normandy on D-Day to helping to capture Hitler's famous Eagle's Nest in the German Alps.

The miniseries originally aired on HBO from September to November of 2001, in ten weekly one-hour episodes, and is still often rerun on the History Channel. It was based on the Steven Ambrose book by the same title, and co-produced by Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg (the team responsible for bringing Saving Private Ryan to the big screen). It garnered wide critical acclaim, and was nominated for nineteen Emmy Awards (of which it won six, including "Outstanding Mini-Series") and awarded the Golden Globe for "Best Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made for Television."

The Story (some spoilers)

Currahee: It's the summer of 1942. At Camp Toccoa, Georgia, a group of young men begin their voluntary training to become part of one of America's newest and most demanding military regiments, the paratroops. Easy Company is under the strict leadership of Lieutenant Herbert Sobel. The petty and egocentric Sobel may succeed in turning the men into elite soldiers, but he fails to win their respect. Instead it's the junior officer, Lieutenant Richard Winters, who earns their admiration, much to Sobel's dismay. After completing basic training at Camp Toccoa, Easy Company heads to Aldbourne, England, to prepare for the invasion of Europe. It becomes painfully obvious that Sobel lacks the skills to keep them alive in the field, and the men grow more and more hesitant about following him into war, to the extent that a group of NCOs attempts to resign in protest. In response, Colonel Robert Sink assigns Sobel to command the new Chilton Foliat jump school and replaces him as Easy's CO with Lieutenant Thomas Meehan. The episode ends as the men board the planes that will take them to Normandy--and D-Day.
Day of Days: In the early hours of June 6th, 1944, known as D-Day, planes carrying thousand of paratroopers take off from England and head for France. Due to the heavy German fire, the jump doesn't go as planned, and Easy Company is scattered all over Normandy. Winters and Private John Hall from Able company (along with Carwood Lipton, Bill Guarnere, Joe Toye, Don Malarkey, and Popeye Wynn) must reach their objective before it's too late. It becomes clear that ninety percent of the company is missing, including its commanding officer, Meehan. It's up to Winters and the small group of Easy men to take out a German artillery installation. At the end of the day, Winters has won his first battle, but he's also lost his first man.
Carentan: Much of this episode follows Albert Blithe, a Toccoa man and a private in Easy Company. A few days after D-Day, he is still wandering lost through Normandy. He hooks up with the remainder of Easy, now officially led by Winters. The company attacks the French town of Carentan, and in the ensuing battle, Blithe is so traumatized that he suffers a brief episode of hysterical blindness. That night, he is advised by both Lieutenant Ronald Speirs of Dog Company and Lieutenant Harry Welsh of Easy to look at the war as little more than a game, each advance just a way of "moving the ball forward." On the way out of Carentan, Easy runs into a German counterattack, which the arrival of tanks eventually quashes. Blithe shoots his first German, and the next day, emboldened by his success, volunteers for a patrol that goes awry. After little over a month in France, Easy returns briefly to England, but is soon informed that they will be sent back to the war--this time for good.
Replacements: Just before Easy leaves England, its ranks swell with the addition of a group of young, newly trained replacements, including Babe Heffron, James Miller, Lester Hashey, and Antonio Garcia. This time the men jump into German-occupied Holland as part of a campaign known as Operation Market Garden, in which Easy's role is to help recapture key towns and thus secure a corridor through which the Allies may advance on Germany. They liberate the town of Eindhoven, but their victory is short-lived: the next town on which they advance is held by a superior German force, and the American and British attackers suffer many casualties. Sergeant Bull Randleman is wounded and momentarily forgotten in the retreat, left to fend for himself overnight. Meanwhile, his squad members mount a search through enemy territory. In the morning, Easy moves on, and intelligence officer Captain Lewis Nixon reports that Operation Market Garden has failed. The Allies will have to find another way into Germany.
Crossroads: In a mission in the Nijmegen Salient, Winters leads his men into a massacre of unprepared German soldiers, and is subsequently haunted by recurring flashbacks. In the aftermath, Sink promotes Winters to Battalion Executive Officer (XO) and places Lieutenant Moose Heyliger in charge of Easy. Heyliger leads Easy in a rescue mission across the river to Arnhem, where they help the beleaguered British 1st Airborne Division ("Red Devils") to safety. Meanwhile, Winters becomes more and more dissatisfied by what is essentially a desk job, and the company's fortunes take a turn for the worse when an accident makes Lieutenant Norman Dike (called "Foxhole Norman") Easy's CO. Shortly after, a severely undermanned and understocked company is sent to the Ardennes Forest, where they are expected to hold the line against an overwhelming German force and a brutal winter.
Bastogne: This episode is mostly seen through the eyes of Eugene Roe, a medic who hitherto has played a minor role in the series. As German bombardments batter Easy's position in the woods outside the Belgian town of Bastogne (during the famous Battle of the Bulge), Roe desperately scrounges for much-needed supplies and treats the various complaints of the battered and demoralized men. He makes periodic visits to the aid station at Bastogne, where he befriends a young nurse named Renee Lemaire. On Christmas Day, Easy is congratulated by Sink for holding the line against all odds, but as the winter progresses their situation--and the intensity of the German attacks--only worsens.
The Breaking Point: This episode, narrated by First Sergeant Lipton, resumes the story of Easy's stay outside Bastogne as the company prepares to assault the German-held town of Foy. More artillery bombardments pound the exhausted men, wounding and killing many experienced soldiers. Dike increasingly proves himself unfit to lead, and Lipton, left as the de facto commander of Easy, takes the extreme step of informing Winters of the men's loss of faith in their CO. Though Winters wishes to officially replace Dike, he is powerless to do so and has no other viable options. In the attack on Foy, Dike freezes up, and Winters is finally able to install a competent CO: Speirs, formerly of Dog Company. The town is taken successfully, but not without more loss of life.
The Last Patrol: Private David Webster returns from a long stay in the hospital to find an unrecognizably reduced Easy Company billeted in Haguenau, a town near the German border. Arriving at the same time is recent West Point graduate Lieutenant Henry Jones. They are both assigned to second platoon, where Jones replaces Sergeant Malarkey as platoon leader, and they both feel estranged from their new platoon mates, whose relationships have been cemented by the ordeal in Bastogne. A dangerous (and, in the eyes of the men, unnecessary) mission is ordered by Sink: Speirs is to send a patrol across the river to take German prisoners. The patrol, led by Sergeant Johnny Martin, achieves its objective but loses a man. Sink, hoping to acquire more useful prisoners, orders another patrol the next night, and Winters is placed in the difficult position of having to impose another unnecessary mission on his men.
Why We Fight: Easy enters Germany at long last and commandeers civilian housing. While new replacements like Private Patrick O'Keefe remain enthused about the prospect of combat, the veterans are ready to settle in as hostilities wind down. Nixon, who has just participated in a jump with the 17th Airborne that went horribly wrong, grows ever more cynical about the justification for this so-called "last good war," and his excessive drinking earns him a demotion at regiment. However, as the episode's title suggests, a shocking discovery by a group of Easy men reminds him of one of the most compelling reasons that the company is fighting. The deaths of President Roosevelt and Adolf Hitler are announced in swift succession, signaling the gradual cessation of the war.
Points: In this, the final episode, Easy Company helps to capture Hitler's Eagle's Nest in the German Alps, then moves on to scenic, peaceful Austria. Although the war in Europe is essentially over, the casualties do not cease--the result of too much free time and too much access to alcohol and firearms. The 101st is to be redeployed to the Pacific theater soon, and most of the men cannot return home until they rack up the requisite number of "points" on their service records. Winters does what he can to keep as many as possible out of danger, even as he and Nixon attempt to transfer to a unit whose departure for the Pacific is imminent. At the end of the episode, Winters reports the news of Japan's surrender to his men, and their postwar fates are given in voiceover.

The Characters: Primary

Buck Compton (played by Neal McDonough)

Buck was an all-American baseball player at UCLA before he enlisted and went to Officer Candidate School (OCS). He joined Easy Company as a lieutenant midway through "Currahee," mere weeks before D-Day. Buck is a favorite among the men and can frequently be found drinking or gambling with them--a fact that initially makes Winters uneasy. He is wounded in "Replacements" and returns to Easy in "Crossroads," just in time to accompany the men to Bastogne, where he heads second platoon. As a result of his leadership abilities and skills in the field, in Bastogne he is considered by Winters and Nixon as a candidate for replacing Dike as company commander, but the events of that winter change him irrevocably.

Bill Guarnere (played by Frank John Hughes)

Guarnere is a Toccoa man from South Philadelphia. He is often called "Gonorrhea" or "Wild Bill" by friends, the latter because of his hair-trigger temper and bravery in the field. As a staff sergeant and one of only two Easy men to win a Silver Star for valor, Guarnere is recognized as one of the finest soldiers in the company. However, he also has a softer side that we see when he "adopts" new soldier Babe, a fellow South Philly native, in "Replacements." He is also close friends with Toye.

Babe Heffron (played by Robin Laing)

Babe, like Guarnere a native of South Philly, joins Easy Company in "Replacements," shortly before the invasion of Holland. The veterans of the company (particularly Guarnere) take Babe under their wing, and in later episodes he pays it forward by watching out for some of the newer replacements. In Bastogne, where his traumatic experiences change him dramatically, he forms a close bond with company medic Roe.

Don Hoobler (played by Peter McCabe)

Hoobler, often called Hoobs, is an original member of Easy's first platoon who hails from Ohio. Early in the show, he expresses a desire to find a German Luger to take home as a souvenir. Even in the later days of the war, he seems to almost enjoy combat, and is often in the heat of the action; for example, in "Replacements" he gladly accompanies his squad to search for his missing sergeant, Bull.

Joe Liebgott (played by Ross McCall)

Liebgott, a cab driver from San Francisco, is the only visible Jewish soldier in Easy. He acts as a German translator, but from the beginning he is characterized as single-minded in his apparent determination to kill every Nazi in Europe. Simultaneously, he cares deeply for his fellow soldiers and can be almost tender with the wounded. He has an emotionally charged relationship with Webster, toward whom he seems sometimes affectionate and sometimes resentful.

Carwood Lipton (played by Donnie Wahlberg)

Lipton hails from Huntington, West Virginia, where he and his brother helped his mother run a boardinghouse after his father died young. Perhaps as a result, Lipton seems to be one of the most conscientious and self-sacrificing soldiers in Easy; as one of the few married men, he is also one of the more mature. He serves as Easy's first sergeant for several months, but as we see in the Bastogne episodes, he is essentially the de facto commander under Dike's incompetent leadership. At the end of "The Breaking Point" (which he narrates), he is promoted to lieutenant.

George Luz (played by Rick Gomez)

Luz, a Rhode Island native, is the chain-smoking, wise-cracking company clown, and as such serves as something of a morale barometer for the rest of the men. In many episodes he shows off his talent for imitations of others (usually ranking officers), but he also uses his voice in an official capacity: as the company radioman. He is unusual among Easy soldiers in that upon his arrival in Bastogne, he has never been wounded.

Don Malarkey (played by Scott Grimes)

Malarkey hails from Astoria, Oregon. He comes to Easy Company as an innocent who doesn't quite seem to take the war seriously; in "Day of Days" he crawls out under fire in to get a Luger for his kid brother, and even befriends a young German PoW. His easy-going demeanor makes him friends with most of the company, in particular Muck, Penkala, Guarnere, Toye, and Buck. However, as the series progresses we watch him harden into a battle-weary veteran. By "The Last Patrol," he is leading second platoon in the absence of a ranking officer.

Johnny Martin (played by Dexter Fletcher)

Johnny, who comes from Columbus, Ohio, is a no-nonsense sergeant in first platoon. He can be recognized by the expression in his photo, which in fandom is often called the Glare of Doom. Despite his tough façade, he forms close relationships with several members of the company, especially Bull and Guarnere. He is also a top-notch soldier who takes on many responsibilities when Easy's officer corps is decimated in Bastogne, and he heads the dangerous mission featured in "The Last Patrol."

Skip Muck (played by Richard Speight Jr.)

Muck comes from Tonawanda, New York, where he was friends with the soldier who inspired Saving Private Ryan. He's usually found with Malarkey and/or Penkala, who encourage his gentle goofiness and wise-cracking. After the war he plans to return home and marry his childhood sweetheart "Sweet Faye Tanner." Despite not getting a great deal of screentime, he tends to be a fan favorite.

Lewis Nixon (played by Ron Livingston)

Nixon is a bit of an anomaly in Easy: a Yale graduate, a married man, and a member of a wealthy family that essentially owns all of Nixon, New Jersey. He trained with Easy in Camp Toccoa but serves as intelligence officer for the regiment, meaning that he's involved in the mapping and planning of attacks. Rarely without a flask of Vat 69, he is a heavy drinker and something of a cynic, and yet--because opposites attract--he is best friends with Winters, whose company he prefers to that of other regimental officers. In "Why We Fight," he admits that he has never fired his weapon over the course of the entire war thus far.

Alex Penkala (played by Tim Matthews)

Penkala rounds out the Malarkey-Muck-Penkala trio. This close-knit group, along with More, serves as second platoon's mortar unit, and Penkala is rarely seen separate from it. He tends to be a little more cynical and a little less talkative than his counterparts.

Frank Perconte (played by James Madio)

Perconte, who comes from Joilet, Illinois, is one of the oldest and yet one of the shortest members of Easy Company, and historically speaking was one of the first to report to Camp Toccoa. He carries first platoon's radio, and he has a close relationship with Easy's main radioman, Luz. Perconte's quite a character: he tends to be a complainer, he collects watches from German corpses, and he always seems to have a toothbrush in hand.

Shifty Powers (played by Peter Youngblood Hills)

Shifty comes from Virginia, where he worked at a naval shipyard before he and Popeye dared each other to join the paratroopers. Shifty is mild-mannered and self-effacing, but all the hunting he did while growing up has made him Easy Company's best sharpshooter, and the men depend on him as a sniper.

Bull Randleman (played by Michael Cudlitz)

Bull, whom Martin and Guarnere tease for being an Arkansas hayseed, is the even-tempered giant of Easy. He's close friends with Martin and a calming influence on new young soldiers. However, in "Replacements" (an episode in which he features prominently), Bull proves himself as rugged and unwavering a fighter as any man in the company.

Eugene Roe (played by Shane Taylor)

Roe is a native of Louisiana, where his grandmother was a faith healer, or "traiteuse" (masculine: "traiteur"). Appropriately, Roe himself serves as Easy's main medic. He selflessly cares for his fellow soldiers under fire, but in "Bastogne," in which he features, we see that he watches out for them even outside of a medical context. In this episode, he breaks his usual self-enforced isolation and bonds with both Babe and Renee Lemaire, a young nurse stationed in the nearby town.

Ronald Speirs (played by Matthew Settle)

Speirs enters the war as a lieutenant in Dog Company. In this role, he runs into Easy Company several times, and each encounter multiplies the fantastic regimental legends that surround him. (E.g., he once massacred a group of unarmed German prisoners--whose numbers keep increasing--and even shot one of his own men for being drunk on duty.) After the Battle of the Bulge, Speirs replaces Dike as Easy's commander (with Winters's blessing), and his fearsome reputation gives way to reality: he is a superb, albeit taciturn, CO. He does, however, have one common soldierly flaw: he compulsively steals souvenirs.

Floyd Talbert (played by Matthew Leitch)

Talbert is from Kokomo, Indiana, and is known around Easy as being excellent with the ladies--he manages to get action in Holland and famously hoards prophylactics at Camp Toccoa. In "Carentan," he's mistaken for a German by Private Smith and stabbed with a bayonet, for which he later receives much teasing. After Bastogne he replaces Lipton as Easy's first sergeant, but only briefly: he soon requests and is granted a demotion to Staff Sergeant so that he may return to the men.

Joe Toye (played by Kirk Acevedo)

Toye, who hails from Pennsylvania, is one of Easy's toughest soldiers. Among the personal arsenal he carries into combat is a set of brass knuckles, and he's known for staying on the line--and even breaking out of the hospital--despite injury. He's good friends with fellow second platooner Guarnere, whom he can match in any attitude contest. On the troop ship to England, he claims that his wartime goal is to assassinate Hitler, so that Roosevelt will rename Thanksgiving "Joe Toye Day" and keep him in dough for the rest of his life.

David Webster (played by Eion Bailey)

Webster was an English major at Harvard before he dropped out to join the paratroopers. Though he trained at Toccoa, he served with Second Battalion's Headquarters Company in France before finally joining Easy just prior to the departure for Holland. There he's wounded, and he spends several months in the hospital before returning to a much-changed, Bastogne-battered Easy in "The Last Patrol." He narrates this episode from something of an outsider's perspective. Like Liebgott, he often serves as a German translator.

Harry Welsh (played by Rick Warden)

Welsh first served with the 82nd Airborne, where he was frequently demoted for fighting. Finally, he attended OCS and joined Easy Company as a lieutenant not long before shipping out. He brings intense--albeit sometimes inappropriate--zeal to everything he does, from fighting to carousing; in fact, he sees war itself as little more than a sport. He is also Easy's resident romantic, sending his reserve parachute home to be used as wedding-dress material by his fiancée Kitty.

Richard Winters (played by Damian Lewis)

Winters is the heart of Easy Company and the miniseries. From OCS he enters Easy Company as a lieutenant, where he quickly gains the respect of officers and enlisted men alike. His rank rises quickly as his natural leadership and excellent combat skills became apparent: he progresses from a platoon leader to Easy's XO, then to CO (replacing Captain Sobel), and finally to Battalion XO. Throughout it all, his men are always his first priority, and he often chooses to remain with them in unpleasant field conditions when he could be back at regiment. Although he is best friends with Nixon, Winters neither smokes nor drinks, and he hopes for a quiet life in peace when the war ends.

Popeye Wynn (played by Nicholas Aaron)

Popeye is a Toccoa man from Virginia, where he knew Shifty before the war. He's most memorable as one of the first Easy men we see injured, when he's shot in the ass on D-Day while trying to take the German position in "Day of Days." In "Replacements" he breaks out of the hospital to rejoin his company before their jump into Holland.

The Characters: Secondary (i.e., Names to Know)

Mo Alley (played by George Calil): an Easy enlisted man; part of the Haguenau patrol in "The Last Patrol."
Albert Blithe (played by Marc Warren): an Easy enlisted man; featured in "Carentan"; gets lost in Normandy on D-Day and suffers from hysterical blindness after his first combat experience.
Pat Christenson (played by Michael Fassbender): an Easy NCO; one of Sobel's particular targets in "Currahee."
Roy Cobb (played by Craig Heaney): an Easy enlisted man; injured in the plane on D-Day (about which he is very bitter); something of a bully, he picks on replacements and harasses Webster in "The Last Patrol," but helps to find his squad sergeant Bull in "Replacements."
Norman Dike (played by Peter O'Meara): Easy's CO after Heyliger and before Speirs; grossly incompetent.
Jack Foley (played by Jamie Bamber): an inexperienced lieutenant who takes over first platoon after Peacock is sent on furlough in "The Breaking Point."
Antonio Garcia (played by Douglas Spain): a new arrival in "Replacements" who sees his first combat in Holland. A member of the patrol in "The Last Patrol."
Smokey Gordon (played by Ben Caplan): an Easy enlisted man; another particular target of Sobel's at Toccoa; gives one of his three Purple Hearts to Talbert after Talbert is wounded by Smith outside Carentan, and composes a poem titled "The Night of the Bayonet" for the occasion.
Chuck Grant (played by Nolan Hemmings): an Easy NCO; one of the men who attempts to resign in "Currahee"; part of the Haguenau patrol.
Lester Hashey (played by Mark Huberman): another new man in "Replacements"; initially somewhat bumbling in combat; friend of Garcia.
Moose Heyliger (played by Stephen McCole): Easy CO replacing Winters; leads the company in their rescue mission in "Crossroads"; replaced by Dike.
Henry Jones (played by Colin Hanks): a recent West Point graduate in "The Last Patrol"; assigned to lead second platoon (replacing Malarkey, who has been leading in the absence of an officer); accompanies the patrol as an "observer"; initially viewed with skepticism by the men, but proves himself in battle and is soon promoted to regimental staff.
Renee Lemaire (played by Lucie Jeanne): a talented young Belgian nurse who works at the aid station in Bastogne; befriends Roe.
Earl McClung (played by Rocky Marshall): an Easy enlisted man; part of the patrol in "The Last Patrol."
Thomas Meehan (played by Jason O'Mara): Easy CO replacing Sobel; goes missing on D-Day and is replaced by Winters.
James Miller (played by James McAvoy): another new man in "Replacements"; friend of Garcia and Hashey.
Alton More (played by Doug Allen): an Easy enlisted man; somewhat reckless, talking back to Speirs and taking a motorcycle joyride with Malarkey in "Carentan"; steals Hitler's photo album from the Eagle's Nest in "Points." Part of second platoon's mortar squad, along with Muck, Malarkey and Penkala.
Patrick O'Keefe (played by Matt Hickey): a replacement in "Why We Fight"; goes by "Paddy"; irritates Perconte with his naïve enthusiasm for combat.
Thomas Peacock (played by David Nicolle): the earnest but pathetically inept leader of first platoon; sent on a thirty-day furlough to the States in "The Breaking Point," so that he doesn't cause any more problems; replaced by Foley.
Joseph Ramirez (played by Rene L. Moreno): an Easy enlisted man; part of the patrol in "The Last Patrol."
Edward Shames (played by Joseph May): leader of third platoon; overzealous (Winters says that he's "seen too many war movies") and disliked by his men.
Robert Sink (played by Dale Dye): commander of the 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment.
Skinny Sisk (played by Phil Barantini): an Easy enlisted man; part of the patrol in "The Last Patrol"; accompanies Liebgott and Webster on a mission of vigilante justice in "Points." (For an exhaustive, episode-by-episode chronicle of Skinny's part in the miniseries, see catcar's BoB Girls' Guide to Skinny.)
Herbert Sobel (played by David Schwimmer): Easy's first CO while at Camp Toccoa and in England; a good tough training officer, but useless in the field; eventually reassigned to the Chilton Foliat jump school and replaced by Meehan.
Ralph Spina (played by Tony Devlin): an Easy company medic; friend of Roe.
Edward Tipper (played by Bart Ruspoli): an Easy enlisted man; wounded in Carentan and helped by Liebgott.

The Fandom: A Civilized Place for Civilized Fen (©

septicemic)

The Band of Brothers fandom, at least in its LJ-based incarnation, mostly centers around two communities.

camp_toccoa, the original slash-centric group, was founded in 2003 by the "Dirty Dozen";

aldbournewhores, a more gen-centric group, was created in 2004 by

hiyacynth and

cunien. The two groups have a great deal of membership overlap, and the gen and slash contingents of the fandom (to whatever extent they differentiate themselves) get along well.

On the slash side, the most popular pairing is, unsurprisingly, Winters/Nixon. For more information, see

halfnorn's very good essay at

ship_manifesto. Other traditional fan favorites include the intense love-hate relationship of Webster/Liebgott; the buddy-buddy Muck/Malarkey, Bull/Johnny, and Luz/Lipton; the angsty Babe/Roe; and the compelling power dynamics of Lipton/Speirs. For visual evidence of these and other pairings, see this picspam post by yours truly.

One of the most complicated issues in the fandom, given the historical basis of the miniseries, is the possible RPF slant. There has always been some concern among fanfic writers that their work might be interpreted incorrectly, and as a result most make a clear distinction between the real men of Easy--many of whom are still living today--and the characters portrayed in fanfiction. Of course, every writer has his/her own comfort level with the source material and draws his/her own boundaries, but generally the fandom emphasizes fanfiction's degree of removal from reality: the fic is based on a miniseries that is based on a book, and the material is altered and fictionalized at each step along the way. And, of course, none of us thinks that what we write is in any way a reflection on what really happened. We're just making our own, profitless fun.

The Resources

General Series Information

Character Guides

Band of Brothers Character Guide: photos and episode appearances of almost every character
Pictorial guide to major characters
Band of Brothers Trading Cards: abyssinia4077's guide to major characters

Media

Screencap collection compiled by iamsab
Band of Brothers screencaps from cap_it
Photo gallery
Screencaps compiled by shadowomega and dryope
"Homophony": a Winters/Nixon fanart series by tenebris
Squared Pixels: icons by nullsechs
Icon archive of damson's work

Livejournal Communities

camp_toccoa: slash-specific fan community (where it all started)
aldbournewhores: more gen-based fan community
currahee506: fanworks community (fanfiction, graphics, and screencaps)
bob100: drabble community
runningcurrahee: HQ for Berlin by Christmas 2006 (fourth annual Secret Santa fic exchange), run by angelicrogue and shadowomega
bandofbrothers: general fan community
bobicons: icon community
currahee_stamp: stamping community

Fanfiction and Meta

We Saw Winters Kissing Santa Claus: 2003 first annual Secret Santa fic exchange, run by nullsechs
Berlin by Christmas 2004: second annual Secret Santa fic exchange, run by nullsechs
Drop intp Holland: 2005 midyear fic exchange, run by abyssinia4077
Berlin by Christmas 2005: third annual Secret Santa fic exchange, run by hiyacynth
Well-nigh exhaustive list of fic posted on LJ, by skyearth85
"A Man, His Dog, and His Major": halfnorn's Winters/Nixon essay for ship_manifesto

Research

Roe's family site
WildBillGuarnere.com: Guarnere's family site
Airborne Picture File: maps, photos of Normandy, etc.
The 506th Parachute Regiment During World War II: overview of the regiment's history

Relevant Books

Band of Brothers by Stephen Ambrose: the book that inspired the miniseries
Beyond Band of Brothers by Dick Winters: Winters's war memoirs
Parachute Infantry by David Kenyon Webster: Webster's war memoirs
Fan-created index to Parachute Infantry, by hiyacynth
Biggest Brother by Larry Alexander: biography of Winters
Donald R. Burgett's series on the 101st Airborne Division: Currahee!: A Screaming Eagle at Normandy, The Road to Arnhem: A Screaming Eagle in Holland, Seven Roads to Hell: A Screaming Eagle at Bastogne, and Beyond the Rhine: A Screaming Eagle in Germany

This overview was in no way a one-person job; it was a group effort. So credit and many, many thanks go to:

abyssinia4077 for capping and cropping the character pictures, contributing to/writing all of the bios, helping to compile links, proofreading this whole overview, pulling late nights with me, and being an all-around genius consultant.
atomichatred82, britland, damson, and mrbnatural for helping to compile links.
hiyacynth for helping to compile links, and for general encouragement and advice.
irmelin for helping to compile links, writing the recaps for "Currahee" and "Day of Days," contributing to Popeye's bio, and producing great Popeye screencaps.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Would you mind cutting that header image? It's making my f-list scroll sideways.

Sorry! Cutting now.

Yeah, mine too. Also, the Shakespeare quote is wrapping oddly on both my f-page and the crack_van page.

Never mind, now it's cut it's displaying fine in S1 view :)

Excellent overview, thank you.

Thank you for allowing me to do it!

Excellent overview of the series and fandom.

Thank you!

Fantastic Overview!

Thanks for sharing!

You're welcome :)

Wow, very thorough overview! I love the miniseries, but I've never really gotten into the fandom- maybe your recs will be able to do something about that. :)

Hee, "thorough" is one word; "obsessive" is another. I prefer yours. :) Anyway, thank you, and I hope you do enjoy the fics I rec this month.

Great overview! Looking forwards to the recs.

The first should be up sometime today--I hope you enjoy it!

OMG YAYE! And I had missed your picspam the first time around. So much love!

YAY! So glad you enjoyed the picspam. This show just CRIES OUT for fangirls, you know?

Wow, it turned out great! You did a wonderful job! I am very impressed. And

abyssinia4077 picked some great caps (Lipton! Harry!).

Didn't she? She is amazing.

And thank you! I'm glad it somewhat lived up to expectations.

You know, looking at this, I'm fascinated by how big all of this has become in comparison to the way it started. Whoa.

Hahaha, I know, it kind of amazes me and I came a year late to the party. It's gotten unexpectedly big.

It's funny, I had to go back through my LJ comment archives after reading this-- and it's like, fuck, there were three of us, and now C_T's got hundreds. It's like one of those 'grow your own crystals' sets, in a way.

I still think you did an amazing job on this - it also really makes me want to watch again. *sighs*

Glad I could help and yay you for taking this on.

I know! I may have to sit down and do a marathon this winter. Too bad YOU ARE NOT HERE TO DO IT WITH ME.

(My inbox is full of you. Which still doesn't make up for my HOUSE not being full of you. :( :( :()

I'm suggest to all BoB fan to read it ^o^/*
Can I suggest you other links? -//-

Oh, thanks so much for spreading it around!

I'd love other links, if you've got any.

http://www.dhak.net/bobscreencaps/ by

shadowomega (BoB Screencaps) and the Photo Gallery is by

dryope
... interest to add RPG communities?

Excellent overview, especially the lowdown on each of the men! (And I squeed a little when I saw my name. lol)
You're a star.
x.

Thank you! Expect to be squeeing again later in the month.... :D

I watched Band of Brothers for the first time this fall, thanks to Netflix, and was blown away at the chemistry between Winters and Nixon. I'm glad to have a place to look for stories about them!

The Babylon 5 link comes here.

http://community.livejournal.com/bobfandom_links/profile
here it's a completed list of all the lj communities about this series :)
(members only, but open membership)

Edited 2010-02-25 15:43 (UTC)

skyyyyyyy!! How come that I didn't see this until now!! Thanks to your awesome link, bb! :D

Fandom Overview: Band of Brothers

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B5

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