Good concept, poorly executed.

The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

The tone of this movie is interesting -- the stakes are both dramatic and high, but it's balanced with a lot of fun, tongue and cheek dialogue.

Great story, amazing characters, superb action, enthralling cinematography. Yes, this is something I am glad I spent money on.

What I remember as a kid was just how easy the German soldiers were killed and how hard it was for the Germans to kill an American. As little I understood about anything as a ten year old I understood that. Whenever a German was shot he would spring up to his feet with his chin up in the air and was hit by three or four more bullets so he died for sure and not have to be treated by the medic. As observed in other reviews only the replacement non regular Americans were killed. Except Long John who was shot probably a dozen times over the years but it was always a shoulder or leg flesh wound. I guess during WWII you had to be shot up pretty good to go home.In fact every time I watch Combat today on Me TV I still wonder why it took four years to beat the Germans. If they fought as poorly as they do on Combat the European theater should have ended by spring of 1942. Of course I didn't see it at the theater but on TV.

I never missed a show for the first three or so seasons. I knew all about the men of the squadron, but I had questions the show didn't answer, like how come Lt. Hanley wasn't on every week? Did he have obligations elsewhere that occasionally kept him from leading his men into combat? This meant that, once again, most of the grunt work was done by the sergeant and the other non-coms. Also, why did every French town they went into have a river with a step bridge over it? It's like that TV executive I saw in a movie once who said that the audience wasn't smart enough to notice little things like the above. An eight-year-old noticed it. So much for the intelligence of TV executives, whose IQs haven't risen much some 50 years hence.The end of "Combat" came as a result, I guess, of the media's turning on the soldiers fighting in Vietnam. The news readers' anti-war stance suddenly made the depiction of fighting men on TV unfashionable. While it was on, it gave me an idea of what it was like for my father to do battle in little French towns like the ones Sgt. Saunders and his men fought in.

I was born during a war and grew up with war in the headlines of newspapers thru-out the USA. In grade school thru high school we were at war in Vietnam and little did I know I would be in a war that lasted long enough to be drafted. In reality war is very, very terribly, horrible. I don't see any wrong in showing and telling about war and learning from it. Combat did not glorify war but told about emotions and how men deal with them in any circumstance. Combat should have gotten the Oscar for a televised series. It was the equivalent to what SAVING PRIVATE RYAN was on the movie theater. All hands down, there could not have been a most perfectly chosen cast for a squad of men and the German counterparts of which some of them were regularly casted as German Soldiers. Most people don't like too much foreign dialect in a movie, but COMBAT was an exception with both French & German spoken. It made it more real. A viewer could almost understand what they were basically saying in German if you watched every episode such as I. It is great to see it back on cable television 5 times a week and now on DVD. It brings back memories of growing up in the black and white days of television. Combat made it into the new color-cast TV era. Each & everyone of the squad deserved to have their handprints in cement. In 1999 the cast held a reunion of COMBAT and another one a couple of yrs. later. A 3rd one was in the planning stages til Ric Jason died. The public was invited to these reunions, one in Las Vegas and the 2nd one in Florida on a cruise ship. Since then Little John and Lt.Hanson passed away. I guess there will be no more since the main characters, Sgt Saunders,Pvt.Little John and Lt.Hanson have gone. It's a shame the recognition of such professional acting when television was still in early stages that these actors weren't given their due. When I hear the death of one pass on a little bit of me goes with them. There won't be another series of any war on TV that could touch the "COMBAT" series. I liked Sheckey Green as the jokester in "COMBAT,S" 1st year,but he quit because of doing Las Vegas Shows at the same time they were shooting "COMBAT". After he left the show it got more serious and very dramatic in the episodes that followed. I don't think his comedy would have fit in the show as the producers were feeling around on the scripts that were written for each and every show. It seemed everyone in the squad had a special script written for them. I have watched every episode,each & every year and found it to be that they all had their moments thru-out the series. One could see the individuality of their acting abilities. They all deserve an Oscar. This show was about a squad of men and a special guest star of "TOP Hollywood ACTORS",some in the prime of their movie career. This was unique at the time when a big "MOVIE ACTOR" would take the time to do a special appearance on a Television Series and the names were "BIG"- Lee Marvin, Charles Bronson,Sal Mineo,James Coburn,Richard Basehart,James Caan,Robert Duvall and the list goes on. You couldn't imagine the series "COMBAT" without a lowly Private named Kirby who was the squad's BAR MAN and could find a way to get into trouble accidentally but you could count on him and his BAR to cover your back; French speaking PFC Caje,whose character fit to a tee from D-DAY,Normandy thru their push into France; Little John,a giant of a man and Billy who buddied up to each other just as in real war; Mother Goose,Sgt Saunters who kept the squad in line and also had a lot of input in most episodes; LT. Hanley who led the charge in a lot of episodes and sometimes stayed in the background giving orders to Sgt Saunders to carry out; and two different Medics in the series,Actor Conley being the most recognized of the two. The series would not be what it became in the 5 years it ran on TV. The ingredient's was a perfect mix of cast members,writers,producers and directors. It surely was one of a kind and I don't think there ever will be another mix of so many characters that blended so well together in one series and each and every episode so different and not just about war. I think "COMBAT" is at least just as popular now in syndication on Cable Television and DVD then when it was being produced in 1962-1967. Since WWll there is Korean, Vietnam,Grenada,Gulf Warl and Gulf Warll veterans and great grand children to sons and daughters of veterans have more interest in our history of wars especially WWll movies,documentaries and books.

I realize that Combat! was about the "drama" and the psychological portrayal of men under the most extreme pressure. But I can never get over the absurd battle scenes. I felt this way when I was seven years old and watching Combat! when it first premiered back in the early 60s, and I feel the same way when I watch it in reruns. It is simply impossible to believe that the Germans were ALWAYS willing to run OUT from under cover and stand still as a statue so Sgt. Saunders and pals could wipe them out in a flash. And if a German sniper, taking minutes to carefully draw a bead with his scoped weapon, ever dared shoot at the "squad", then you could count on the fact that he would certainly miss and just throw up dirt right beside "the sarge", who would then immediately twirl around, machine gun on hip, burp out a couple of rounds, which would magically find the sniper hiding in the tree 3/4 of a mile away. Of course, the squad sometimes was taken by surprise. But those German heavy machine guns, mortars, grenades, and field guns never QUITE hit anybody, except for maybe wounding that week's guest star. And then ole sarge would yelp out the only tactical command he apparently EVER learned in basic training: "flank 'em, Kirby!". "Flank 'em"???? You'd think he could at least occasionally mutter out an "A team lay a base of fire; B team maneuver". Nope. Just "flank 'em". The utter lack of combat realism makes this show annoying. And I haven't even begun to talk about the ever present (overly sensationalized) French Underground, which, according to Combat! must have numbered hundreds of thousands of men, women, and juveniles. Ugh. Enough, already!