The second trailer for Roland Emmerich's Midway was posted on September 12th, 2019. Previously I've looked at the first teaser for this film and came away concerned and rather unimpressed, let's see if this new trailer can make a better impression.
Link to first post: http://uncommonsenseok.blogspot.com/2019/06/midway-2019-trailer-breakdown-and.html
Also, duplicate scenes will be mostly passed over since this is going to be a long one, and I'm poor at identifying actors so any corrections will be appreciated.
New Trailer:
The first shot is of an American carrier, almost certainly Enterprise, steaming towards the rising sun as aircraft on the deck start to spool up their engines. The aircraft are TBD Devastator torpedo bombers, identifiable by their distinct canopies.
On American carriers, torpedo bombers were spotted at the very stern of the ship, as the lighter fighters and dive bombers didn't need as long of a takeoff run to get into the air.
I suspect this is Richard 'Dick' Best (played by Ed Skrein), the executive officer of VB-6 flying off of Enterprise. This scene looks to be him having a conversation with his wife, Anne Best (played by Mandy Moore).
More work on the Enterprise's flight deck showing two definite Dauntlesses on the right side, armed with 100lb bombs on the wing racks. During the raid on Roi the Dauntlesses of VS-6 and VB-6 carried two 100lb bombs under their wings and a 500lb bomb on the centerline station. With the early morning setting, it's probable that this is a scene from just before that raid.
Based on what is seen later in the trailer, this is probably Bruno Gaido (portrayed by Nick Jonas), more on him closer to the end of the trailer.
Once again the entirety of the Pearl Harbor attack is deeply wrong. As the shot fades in a Kate torpedo bomber can be seen with its torpedo still slung under its belly. The shot is too blurry to make out if the wooden fins that prevented the air-dropped weapons from diving too deeply and hitting the bottom are modeled.
More concerning is the fact that no ships are in the right place or are modeled all that accurately, and the torpedo bombers are making their runs from pretty much the worst possible direction for them.
To cover the planes first, the Kates made their torpedo runs across the southern loch to strike the moored battleships broadside. While they would have to contend with the torpedo defense systems, the broadside targets would be much easier to hit and inflict major damage. The battleships at Pearl Harbor were designed to remain afloat even if their ends were riddled and flooding due to the effort put into sealing the armored citadel that enclosed the magazines and the machinery.
The armored citadel ran from slightly aft of Turret #4 to slightly in front of Turret #1. Torpedo protection was via a system of voids and bulkheads that dissipated the explosive force of a torpedo detonation. On several of the ships, additional bulges had been added to the hulls which enhanced this protection, but with the numbers of torpedoes dropped, the unready condition of the ships and their crews, and the concentration of the hits meant that even some of the most modern defenses would have been hard-pressed to keep the ship afloat.
Now to the arrangement of the ships. There were seven battleships moored around Ford Island in the harbor (Utah doesn't count here since she was a training ship at the time of the attack). Six of them were moored in 'Battleship Row', arranged in two parallel lines.
1: USS California, 2: USS Maryland, 3: USS Oklahoma, 4: USS Tennessee, 5: USS West Virginia, 6: USS Arizona, 7: USS Nevada, 8: USS Pennsylvania. The row of four ships on the upper left of the island is where Utah was located.
In the shot from the film, there are two extra battleships in the area south of Battleship Row. This same sort of locational oddity was seen and noted in the first trailer. That particular horse was thoroughly beaten in that post, so it won't be repeated here.
This must be on Arizona, for all the issues of positioning this film looks to have, the presence of a non-battleship and only a single ship behind her means this could only be BB-39. This shot confirms the previous speculation that 'Nevada' in the back is just a reused Arizona model.
This photo is of Nevada in 1933, showing the arrangement of twin turrets over triples. For the most part, she would retain this appearance until after the attack on Pearl Harbor.
This shot shows a group of Zeros making strafing runs along the line of battleships. West Virginia is the more distant battleship, and 'Tennessee' is the closer one. As was explained in the previous post, this is an erroneous shot since Tennessee still had lattice masts at the time of the attack as can be seen in the photo below.
The result of the strafing or a bomb hit on Arizona, with the single battleship in the background and the arranged chairs on the deck. The aircraft is one of Arizona's three Vought OS2U 'Kingfisher' seaplanes, used for spotting the fall of shot and advance scouting.
The moment Arizona's forward magazines detonated. After the torpedo bombers made their runs against the moored battleships, more Kates flew down the length of Battleship Row and dropped modified 16'' armor-piercing shells, targeting the inboard battleships.
Several hits were scored on Maryland and Tennessee, but the most devastating one hit Arizona, glanced off the armored face of Turret II, and it is believed detonated in a black powder magazine for the seaplane catapult. The explosion spread to the nearby magazines for the main battery and detonated them, blowing the structure of the bow apart and starting fires that would burn for several days after the attack. An estimated eight bombs hit Arizona, but with the extensive damage from the magazine detonation and resulting fires it is difficult to tell.
These two are (probably) Chief Aviation Radioman James Murray (played by Keean Johnson) and Richard Best, almost definitely at the time Enterprise enters Pearl Harbor.
This looks to be the headquarters for the US Pacific Fleet in Pearl Harbor, probably just before the titular battle.
An unclear shot of Pearl Harbor, with several smoldering battleships in the background.
This is not very encouraging.
Now, this is an interesting shot. With the extensive battle damage, the most obvious being the gaping hole in the flight deck, this is probably Yorktown. USS Yorktown suffered serious damage at the Battle of the Coral Sea but was repaired to fighting condition in a matter of days so she would be ready for the Battle of Midway.
I will note that the Coral Sea hasn't been shown in any of the trailers, at least not in a recognizable way. Since the main combat plot of the movie looks to follow Enterprise this makes sense since she had just escorted Hornet to launch the Doolittle Raid on the home islands of Japan.
Admiral Nimitz (played by Woody Harrelson) on the left speaking with someone who I cannot identify.
Aircraft launching from Enterprise, with no indication of when in the timeline of the film this is.
Admiral Nimitz again, in this scene he looks to be speaking with Edwin Layton about his suspicion that the Japanese were going to strike at Pearl Harbor.
The Japanese strike package closing in on Midway Atoll. The aircraft front and center looks to be a B5N, known as the Type 97 by the Japanese and as 'Kate' by the Allies, which reprised their role of high-altitude level bombing at Midway.
During the first wave most of these aircraft came from Carrier Division Two, consisting of Hiryu and Soryu. Each carrier contributed 18 of these planes to the attack (though Hiryu had one abort to technical issues), which dropped their bombs from around 11,000 feet.
Soryu faired better, with ten serviceable planes returning to their carrier. But she had lost one plane shot down, two ditched in the ocean, and four more written off due to damage.
Airplanes in this movie seem to hate the sky a lot, so they like to stick close to the ground whenever they can. In this shot are the 'high altitude' Kate bombers armed with AP bombs for the battleships. I suspect that this is supposed to be the bomb that struck Arizona and sank her.
In the actual attack, the Kates that sank Arizona were flying at 10,000 feet and were dropping modified 16'' armor-piercing shells.
Based on the Japanese people and the smoke in the distance, this is probably the aftermath of the Doolittle Raid.
Nothing in particular stands out about the Japanese pilots here. An officer can be seen on the right side, but from what can be seen this could be before the Pearl Harbor attack or it could be right before the Midway attacks.
Again, the planes hate the sky.
The closest aircraft is an A6M Type 0 'Zero' fighter, the Japanese carriers each contributed nine of these aircraft to the attack, for a total of 36. In these shots they are fitted with drop tanks, which granted them an impressive range.
They slaughtered the Marine fighters that challenged the strike force on the way in, and once the bombers made their attacks they remained over the islands to strafe whatever they could find. Two of these fighters were shot down outright, and three more were damaged to the point of being written off.
In the back are more Kates, showing a little bit of what they're armed with. Historically they were each armed with a single Type 80 800 Kg bomb. These ones look to be hauling six 60 kg bombs, which the Japanese did use, but not at Midway.
In the far distance are what look to be the D3A1 Type 99 'Val' dive bombers. These aircraft were launched from the First Carrier Division (Kaga and Akagi), and at Midway were fitted with the 242 kg Type 98 bomb. These were sturdy aircraft, able to withstand the high-speed dives and high-g pullouts that were required for dive-bombing. Only one of these planes was shot down over Midway, and a handful more were damaged by the combined American heavy AA and automatic weapons.
I suspect this is LTC Eugene Lindsey (played by Darren Criss), the commander of VT-6 off the USS Enterprise. He was killed in action along with his gunner when their TBD was shot down by Japanese combat air patrol fighters.
It's baffling as to why the TBD has a torpedo and bombs, since the Devastator was already very slow and lumbering when fitted with a torpedo. Adding a couple of small bombs under the wings would make that even worse. Also from the photos that are available (such as the one below of one of VT-8s TBDs in May 1942), including the wrecked Devastators found at the wreck of USS Lexington, these aircraft didn't have hardpoints located outboard of their landing gear at all.
The close ship on the left side looks to be a cruiser, probably a Tone class due to the lack of apparent stern turrets, the aircraft, and the position of the crane. Tone herself was the flagship of the support group attached to the Kido Butai.
In the distance behind the cruiser is a Kongou class battleship.
On the right side are two destroyers of indeterminate class, but the ships in the far back right are interesting.
Among Japanese warships, there weren't many with three regular funnels like that, and there was just such a ship attached to the carrier force at Midway. The light cruiser Nagara, the lead ship of a six-strong class that were built in the early 1920s. For whatever reason, the model of Nagara was duplicated in this shot to try and fill out the background.
This carrier looks to be Hiryu, due to her very centrally located island, and the supports of the flight deck ends. Nominally Hiryu and Soryu were sister ships, but when finished in 1939 Hiryu was four feet wider and around 2,000 tons greater displacement than Soryu.
This diagram shows the four carriers of the Kido Butai to scale with each other, which allows the many differences between them to be easily seen.
Another shot of a Devastator with the odd loadout closing in on a Japanese destroyer. Eleven of these fast vessels were attached to the Kido Butai, they chased submarines, provided limited AA fire, and some were assigned to steam close ahead of the carriers to recover the crews of any aircraft that didn't manage to take off.
Now, this next part might look like the most stupid Hollywood crap in this entire trailer, but with a few exaggerations, this actually happened. After the raid on the Marshall Islands on February 1st, 1942 a force of five Type 96 medium bombers located Enterprise and her task force around 1330. Poor direction of CAP fighters resulted in only one of the bombers being hit as they made their way towards the carrier.
According to the book The First Team, the Type 96 G3M2 bombers were armed with two 250 Kg bombs for antishipping work when they attacked Enterprise. While the Japanese used this loading of eight 60 Kg bombs against land targets, it's not the correct armament for this attack.
AMM 2/c Bruno Gaido is the man who took to the guns of a parked Dauntless and fired at the doomed bomber.
The wingtip of Nakai's bomber clipped the port side of Enterprise's flight deck, snapped off at the wing root, sliced off the tail of Gaido's Dauntless, before eventually ending up in the ocean.
This is the start of the dive bombers making their attacks on the Kido Butai, pushing over from their shallow dives into the much steeper final attack runs.
Dive bombing was an accurate method of attacking ships, and also helped keep the attacking aircraft safe for a large portion of their attack. The diagram below from Shattered Sword shows the effective and nominal ranges of the Japanese anti-aircraft weapons plotted against the profile of a dive bomber attack.
While the bombers could potentially be hit by 127mm fire from six miles away at 16,000 feet, the limits of fire control meant that the fire was only really effective inside an envelope of about four miles away and 10,000 feet up. Once the bombers started their final dives, moving at 225 knots (about 260 miles an hour) the guns would only have about a minute to engage them inside their most effective range.
The dive bomber attacks weren't without losses, though not nearly as many were shot down in their dives like is shown in the trailer. AA gunners on Kaga were able to shoot down the sixth plane that was diving on their ship, flown by an Ensign J. Roberts, but the rest were able to drop their bombs.
Due to damage and low fuel when they started their attacks, Enterprise's dive bomber force lost 21 aircraft to shootdowns, ditching, or inability to repair the shot-up planes.
The Japanese CAP fighters were far out of position when the dive bombers attacked, so they weren't able to engage the dive bombers before they made their attacks.
Akagi and the single bomb dropped by Dick Best, moments before impact. This is a legitimately nice model of Akagi, and even better there are only three fighters on her deck. For all the issues with the visuals, this is something that is based on some of the more recent research about the battle, which has refuted several myths that have been around for decades now.
The narrative in western literature about Midway was heavily influenced by Fuchida Mitsuo, a Japanese airman who was at both Pearl Harbor and Midway. In Japan, he was heavily discredited for revisionism and contradictions of other accounts, but it wasn't until the 21st century that American and Japanese scholars were able to bridge the gap and start setting the western perception of the battle straight.
In regards to Midway, he made the claim that the Kido Butai had it's aircraft fueled, armed, and spotted on the decks when the Americans arrived. This has been known as the 'Fateful Five Minutes', the idea that if the dive bombers arrived just a few minutes later the IJN would have launched a strike that would have demolished the American task forces.
But this is untrue, as the carriers had been shifting back and forth from land attack to naval strike loadouts, and the force had been under sporadic air attack all morning from Midway, which forced rapid cycling of CAP fighters which left no time to spot a strike on the decks. In reality, the Japanese were probably the better part of an hour away from launching a strike towards the American carriers.
One other small thing of note, the bombers are coming in from the wrong side of the ship, over the starboard side rather than the port side. But this is really a minor complaint.
This might be Lieutenant Clarence Earle Dickinson, a pilot in VS-6 who might have been the one who landed the bomb hit atop Kaga's island, which wiped out the bulk of her officers, including her captain.
This looks to be crewmen congratulating Guaido for his boldness in working to save the ship. Sadly, his aircraft would be shot down at Midway, and it is believed that after being interrogated he was killed by being tied to a weight and thrown overboard.
This is Lieutenant Commander Wade McClusky (played by Luke Evans), the commander of VB-6. His initiative at the battle lead the misguided dive bomber force to the Kido Butai, allowing them to make their attack.
This is a downright wonky little sequence, with a Dauntless being chased by at least two Zeros performing a maneuver known as a Hammerhead Stall. The maneuver is a vertical climb, at the last moment a hard kick of the rudder, which flips the plane around so it's pointing down and is able to go in the opposite direction from when it started.
The SBD was a rugged and capable aircraft, but maneuvers like this are not in its ability.
This looks to be the strike on Kaga. While Dick Best took three planes to hit Akagi, the rest of VB-6 and VS-6 focused on Kaga, with devastating results.
In October 2019, the wreck of Kaga was discovered, and a post about that wreck and the history of the ship can be found here: The Wreck of the Kaga
Oddly enough, these Japanese observers seem to be lagging far behind the gunners at spotting the incoming dive bombers.
As has been stated, there are too many shot down and otherwise damaged aircraft in this shot.
Gunners on a twin 25mm mount on one of the Japanese warships. As near as is known, Akagi had fourteen twin 25mm mounts, and Kaga had fifteen of the same.
The dive on Akagi again, based on the portside island.
Dive bombers that carried their munitions on the centerline employed this type of cradle to ensure that the bomb was clear of the propellor.
As has been said, this is a nice model of Akagi. A nice detail is that it has accurately modeled the older 45 caliber 10th Year Type 12 cm guns that comprised her heavy AA battery.
Sources:
General Historical and Technical
Shattered Sword: The Untold Story of the Battle of Midway. Anthony Tully, Johnathan Parshall. (2005)
The First Team: Pacific Air Combat from Pearl Harbor to Midway. John Lundstrom. (1984)
Combat Colors Number 4: Pearl Harbor and Beyond December 1941 to May 1942. Bridgewater, H.C. and Scott, Peter. 2001.
https://ww2db.com/person_bio.php?person_id=98 - Biography of Fuchida Mitsuo.
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/3773334/clarence-earle-dickinson - Information on Clarence Dickinson.
Pearl Harbor
http://www.navweaps.com/index_oob/OOB_WWII_Pacific/OOB_WWII_Pearl_Harbor.php - General Order of Battle
http://www.navsource.org/archives/01/39a.htm - Photos of Arizona
http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USN/ships/dafs/BB/bb39.html - Damage to Arizona
Carrier Raids
http://www.cv6.org/1942/marshalls/default.htm - Marshall Island Raid information pt. 1
http://www.cv6.org/1942/marshalls/marshalls_2.htm - Marshall Island Raid information pt. 2
http://www.cv6.org/1942/doolittle/doolittle.htm - Doolittle Raid information pt. 1
http://www.cv6.org/1942/doolittle/doolittle_2.htm - Doolittle Raid information pt. 2
Midway
http://www.navweaps.com/index_oob/OOB_WWII_Pacific/OOB_WWII_Midway.php - General Order of Battle
http://www.cv6.org/1942/midway/default.htm - USS Enterprise operations at Midway
http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USMC/USMC-M-Midway.html - Information on the Marine forces on Midway.
http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WNJAP_47-45_10ns.php - Akagi's heavy AA gun.
Movie
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt6924650/?ref_=nv_sr_1?ref_=nv_sr_1 - IMDB page with cast information.
Link to first post: http://uncommonsenseok.blogspot.com/2019/06/midway-2019-trailer-breakdown-and.html
Also, duplicate scenes will be mostly passed over since this is going to be a long one, and I'm poor at identifying actors so any corrections will be appreciated.
New Trailer:
The first shot is of an American carrier, almost certainly Enterprise, steaming towards the rising sun as aircraft on the deck start to spool up their engines. The aircraft are TBD Devastator torpedo bombers, identifiable by their distinct canopies.
On American carriers, torpedo bombers were spotted at the very stern of the ship, as the lighter fighters and dive bombers didn't need as long of a takeoff run to get into the air.
I suspect this is Richard 'Dick' Best (played by Ed Skrein), the executive officer of VB-6 flying off of Enterprise. This scene looks to be him having a conversation with his wife, Anne Best (played by Mandy Moore).
More work on the Enterprise's flight deck showing two definite Dauntlesses on the right side, armed with 100lb bombs on the wing racks. During the raid on Roi the Dauntlesses of VS-6 and VB-6 carried two 100lb bombs under their wings and a 500lb bomb on the centerline station. With the early morning setting, it's probable that this is a scene from just before that raid.
Based on what is seen later in the trailer, this is probably Bruno Gaido (portrayed by Nick Jonas), more on him closer to the end of the trailer.
Once again the entirety of the Pearl Harbor attack is deeply wrong. As the shot fades in a Kate torpedo bomber can be seen with its torpedo still slung under its belly. The shot is too blurry to make out if the wooden fins that prevented the air-dropped weapons from diving too deeply and hitting the bottom are modeled.
More concerning is the fact that no ships are in the right place or are modeled all that accurately, and the torpedo bombers are making their runs from pretty much the worst possible direction for them.
To cover the planes first, the Kates made their torpedo runs across the southern loch to strike the moored battleships broadside. While they would have to contend with the torpedo defense systems, the broadside targets would be much easier to hit and inflict major damage. The battleships at Pearl Harbor were designed to remain afloat even if their ends were riddled and flooding due to the effort put into sealing the armored citadel that enclosed the magazines and the machinery.
The armored citadel ran from slightly aft of Turret #4 to slightly in front of Turret #1. Torpedo protection was via a system of voids and bulkheads that dissipated the explosive force of a torpedo detonation. On several of the ships, additional bulges had been added to the hulls which enhanced this protection, but with the numbers of torpedoes dropped, the unready condition of the ships and their crews, and the concentration of the hits meant that even some of the most modern defenses would have been hard-pressed to keep the ship afloat.
Now to the arrangement of the ships. There were seven battleships moored around Ford Island in the harbor (Utah doesn't count here since she was a training ship at the time of the attack). Six of them were moored in 'Battleship Row', arranged in two parallel lines.
1: USS California, 2: USS Maryland, 3: USS Oklahoma, 4: USS Tennessee, 5: USS West Virginia, 6: USS Arizona, 7: USS Nevada, 8: USS Pennsylvania. The row of four ships on the upper left of the island is where Utah was located.
In the shot from the film, there are two extra battleships in the area south of Battleship Row. This same sort of locational oddity was seen and noted in the first trailer. That particular horse was thoroughly beaten in that post, so it won't be repeated here.
This must be on Arizona, for all the issues of positioning this film looks to have, the presence of a non-battleship and only a single ship behind her means this could only be BB-39. This shot confirms the previous speculation that 'Nevada' in the back is just a reused Arizona model.
This photo is of Nevada in 1933, showing the arrangement of twin turrets over triples. For the most part, she would retain this appearance until after the attack on Pearl Harbor.
This shot shows a group of Zeros making strafing runs along the line of battleships. West Virginia is the more distant battleship, and 'Tennessee' is the closer one. As was explained in the previous post, this is an erroneous shot since Tennessee still had lattice masts at the time of the attack as can be seen in the photo below.
The result of the strafing or a bomb hit on Arizona, with the single battleship in the background and the arranged chairs on the deck. The aircraft is one of Arizona's three Vought OS2U 'Kingfisher' seaplanes, used for spotting the fall of shot and advance scouting.
The moment Arizona's forward magazines detonated. After the torpedo bombers made their runs against the moored battleships, more Kates flew down the length of Battleship Row and dropped modified 16'' armor-piercing shells, targeting the inboard battleships.
Several hits were scored on Maryland and Tennessee, but the most devastating one hit Arizona, glanced off the armored face of Turret II, and it is believed detonated in a black powder magazine for the seaplane catapult. The explosion spread to the nearby magazines for the main battery and detonated them, blowing the structure of the bow apart and starting fires that would burn for several days after the attack. An estimated eight bombs hit Arizona, but with the extensive damage from the magazine detonation and resulting fires it is difficult to tell.
Historically Enterprise reached Pearl Harbor at dusk on December 8th, 1941. Fires were still burning across the harbor, which is fairly accurate. Again, the arrangement of the ships in Battleship Row is wrong, the ships are too far apart and Maryland is flat out missing.
This photo is from a day after Enterprise arrived in Pearl Harbor, and the battleships (except for Nevada) are still in their starting positions.
This looks to be the headquarters for the US Pacific Fleet in Pearl Harbor, probably just before the titular battle.
An unclear shot of Pearl Harbor, with several smoldering battleships in the background.
This is not very encouraging.
I will note that the Coral Sea hasn't been shown in any of the trailers, at least not in a recognizable way. Since the main combat plot of the movie looks to follow Enterprise this makes sense since she had just escorted Hornet to launch the Doolittle Raid on the home islands of Japan.
Admiral Nimitz (played by Woody Harrelson) on the left speaking with someone who I cannot identify.
Aircraft launching from Enterprise, with no indication of when in the timeline of the film this is.
Admiral Nimitz again, in this scene he looks to be speaking with Edwin Layton about his suspicion that the Japanese were going to strike at Pearl Harbor.
The Japanese strike package closing in on Midway Atoll. The aircraft front and center looks to be a B5N, known as the Type 97 by the Japanese and as 'Kate' by the Allies, which reprised their role of high-altitude level bombing at Midway.
During the first wave most of these aircraft came from Carrier Division Two, consisting of Hiryu and Soryu. Each carrier contributed 18 of these planes to the attack (though Hiryu had one abort to technical issues), which dropped their bombs from around 11,000 feet.
They did suffer heavy losses to the Marine fighter squadrons based on Midway, and from the heavy AA fire sent up by the defenders (more details slightly below).
Hiryu lost four Kates outright, two to fighters, one to AA fire, and one simply didn't return to the carrier. One ditched in the ocean near a cruiser, though the crew was rescued. Of the ones that did land on Hiryu, five were written off due to damage. After the first attack on Midway Atoll, Hiryu only had eight Kates in operational condition.Soryu faired better, with ten serviceable planes returning to their carrier. But she had lost one plane shot down, two ditched in the ocean, and four more written off due to damage.
The Marine defenders on Midway, equipped with M1903 Springfield rifles and WWI style 'Brody' helmets. This is accurate equipment, the Marines weren't able to field large numbers of M1 Garand rifles until later in 1942, and the old helmets also had yet to be replaced.
This still from the 1942 film Midway shows Marines from the 6th Defensive Battalion arriving on Midway Atoll in May of that year with their Springfields and helmets.
At the time of the battle, there were between 3,000 and 4,500 Americans stationed on Midway, most of them being Marines. They possessed four old 7'' guns, five 5'' DP guns, four 3'' anti-boat guns, 24 3'' AA guns, several 37mm and 20mm AA guns, 48 .50 caliber machine guns, and 36 .30 caliber MGs.
The Marine gunners gave a good accounting of themselves, inflicting heavy losses on the Japanese attack planes, though not without losses. From Marine Air Group 22 seven were confirmed killed, 35 missing but presumed dead, and 25 wounded. The garrison on the atoll suffered seven killed, and 28 wounded in action.
Airplanes in this movie seem to hate the sky a lot, so they like to stick close to the ground whenever they can. In this shot are the 'high altitude' Kate bombers armed with AP bombs for the battleships. I suspect that this is supposed to be the bomb that struck Arizona and sank her.
In the actual attack, the Kates that sank Arizona were flying at 10,000 feet and were dropping modified 16'' armor-piercing shells.
Based on the Japanese people and the smoke in the distance, this is probably the aftermath of the Doolittle Raid.
Nothing in particular stands out about the Japanese pilots here. An officer can be seen on the right side, but from what can be seen this could be before the Pearl Harbor attack or it could be right before the Midway attacks.
Again, the planes hate the sky.
The closest aircraft is an A6M Type 0 'Zero' fighter, the Japanese carriers each contributed nine of these aircraft to the attack, for a total of 36. In these shots they are fitted with drop tanks, which granted them an impressive range.
They slaughtered the Marine fighters that challenged the strike force on the way in, and once the bombers made their attacks they remained over the islands to strafe whatever they could find. Two of these fighters were shot down outright, and three more were damaged to the point of being written off.
In the back are more Kates, showing a little bit of what they're armed with. Historically they were each armed with a single Type 80 800 Kg bomb. These ones look to be hauling six 60 kg bombs, which the Japanese did use, but not at Midway.
In the far distance are what look to be the D3A1 Type 99 'Val' dive bombers. These aircraft were launched from the First Carrier Division (Kaga and Akagi), and at Midway were fitted with the 242 kg Type 98 bomb. These were sturdy aircraft, able to withstand the high-speed dives and high-g pullouts that were required for dive-bombing. Only one of these planes was shot down over Midway, and a handful more were damaged by the combined American heavy AA and automatic weapons.
The Doolittle raiders here look decent enough, the planes have a bit of an odd CGI sheen to them but it's not especially annoying.
This is very wrong in a multitude of respects. It is true that the Devastators were shot to pieces on their attack runs at the Japanese carriers by AA and fighters. But again, everything is way, way to close to everything else.
Probably this is the doomed run of either VT-6 or VT-8, the torpedo squadrons from Enterprise and Hornet respectively. Neither squadron landed hits with their torpedoes, and they suffered horrendous losses. VT-8 was annihilated during their attack on Soryu with only one survivor, Ensign George Gay, who escaped his aircraft after ditching and hid under a seat cushion to avoid being spotted by the Japanese.
VT-6 faired only slightly better, with five aircraft surviving the attack, but only four aircraft returning to the carrier for no hits scored, with one of those planes deemed irreparable.
There are some issues with the armament on these aircraft, but they'll be covered below when there is a better look at them.
The ships shown are of interest though.
In the first screenshot on the upper right is the stern of what looks like a Tone class cruiser, more details are below. On the lower right is the stern of a Kongou class, and the battleship on the left side is also a Kongou. Two of these modernized WWI-era battlecruisers were at the battle with the carrier force, these being Kirishima and Haruna. It's hard to name the destroyers since most Japanese destroyers from the 1920s onward look fairly similar.
I suspect this is LTC Eugene Lindsey (played by Darren Criss), the commander of VT-6 off the USS Enterprise. He was killed in action along with his gunner when their TBD was shot down by Japanese combat air patrol fighters.
It's baffling as to why the TBD has a torpedo and bombs, since the Devastator was already very slow and lumbering when fitted with a torpedo. Adding a couple of small bombs under the wings would make that even worse. Also from the photos that are available (such as the one below of one of VT-8s TBDs in May 1942), including the wrecked Devastators found at the wreck of USS Lexington, these aircraft didn't have hardpoints located outboard of their landing gear at all.
The close ship on the left side looks to be a cruiser, probably a Tone class due to the lack of apparent stern turrets, the aircraft, and the position of the crane. Tone herself was the flagship of the support group attached to the Kido Butai.
On the right side are two destroyers of indeterminate class, but the ships in the far back right are interesting.
Among Japanese warships, there weren't many with three regular funnels like that, and there was just such a ship attached to the carrier force at Midway. The light cruiser Nagara, the lead ship of a six-strong class that were built in the early 1920s. For whatever reason, the model of Nagara was duplicated in this shot to try and fill out the background.
This carrier looks to be Hiryu, due to her very centrally located island, and the supports of the flight deck ends. Nominally Hiryu and Soryu were sister ships, but when finished in 1939 Hiryu was four feet wider and around 2,000 tons greater displacement than Soryu.
This diagram shows the four carriers of the Kido Butai to scale with each other, which allows the many differences between them to be easily seen.
Another shot of a Devastator with the odd loadout closing in on a Japanese destroyer. Eleven of these fast vessels were attached to the Kido Butai, they chased submarines, provided limited AA fire, and some were assigned to steam close ahead of the carriers to recover the crews of any aircraft that didn't manage to take off.
A Dauntless taking off from Enterprise, surrounded by her escort force. Through the early parts of 1942 Enterprise was accompanied by several cruisers, but this particular one can be identified fairly simply, as can the timing of this shot.
The cruiser on the left is an Astoria class heavy cruiser (Midway was before the Battle of Savo Island, the renaming to New Orleans class came after that battle), armed with nine 8'' guns, six 5'' DP guns, and several smaller AA weapons. This ship is probably supposed to be USS Vincennes (CA-44), which was attached to Task Force 16 at Midway, escorting Enterprise. The other heavy cruisers escorting Enterprise were Pensacola and Northhampton, which look significantly different.
Astoria class have two superfiring triple turrets forward, two funnels close behind the bridge superstructure, two side-mounted aircraft catapults behind the funnels, and another main turret on the stern. The other heavy cruisers that Enterprise sailed with in early 1942 had more wildly spread funnels with their aircraft facilities between them. There were also differences in the masts and bridge structure, with taller tripods, and less blocky bridges.
Unfortunately, the destroyers in the back aren't clear enough to make out details. But based on the presence of Vincennes, this is the Battle of Midway. Enterprise had five destroyers dedicated to escorting her at the battle.
Now, this next part might look like the most stupid Hollywood crap in this entire trailer, but with a few exaggerations, this actually happened. After the raid on the Marshall Islands on February 1st, 1942 a force of five Type 96 medium bombers located Enterprise and her task force around 1330. Poor direction of CAP fighters resulted in only one of the bombers being hit as they made their way towards the carrier.
According to the book The First Team, the Type 96 G3M2 bombers were armed with two 250 Kg bombs for antishipping work when they attacked Enterprise. While the Japanese used this loading of eight 60 Kg bombs against land targets, it's not the correct armament for this attack.
Enterprise is maneuvering, which is good. But oddly her escorts don't seem to be doing the same, and again they are too close together.
The ships in the task force sent up a lot of AA fire at the bombers as they closed, but most of the shells detonated behind the attackers, forcing the persuing CAP fighters to break off their attacks.
Despite being driven off, the hits that the fighters scored doomed the lead plane in the formation, flown by Lt. Nakai. He broke away from the formation and swung back around towards Enterprise, coming into range of the light AA.
AMM 2/c Bruno Gaido is the man who took to the guns of a parked Dauntless and fired at the doomed bomber.
The wingtip of Nakai's bomber clipped the port side of Enterprise's flight deck, snapped off at the wing root, sliced off the tail of Gaido's Dauntless, before eventually ending up in the ocean.
This is the start of the dive bombers making their attacks on the Kido Butai, pushing over from their shallow dives into the much steeper final attack runs.
Dive bombing was an accurate method of attacking ships, and also helped keep the attacking aircraft safe for a large portion of their attack. The diagram below from Shattered Sword shows the effective and nominal ranges of the Japanese anti-aircraft weapons plotted against the profile of a dive bomber attack.
While the bombers could potentially be hit by 127mm fire from six miles away at 16,000 feet, the limits of fire control meant that the fire was only really effective inside an envelope of about four miles away and 10,000 feet up. Once the bombers started their final dives, moving at 225 knots (about 260 miles an hour) the guns would only have about a minute to engage them inside their most effective range.
The dive bomber attacks weren't without losses, though not nearly as many were shot down in their dives like is shown in the trailer. AA gunners on Kaga were able to shoot down the sixth plane that was diving on their ship, flown by an Ensign J. Roberts, but the rest were able to drop their bombs.
Due to damage and low fuel when they started their attacks, Enterprise's dive bomber force lost 21 aircraft to shootdowns, ditching, or inability to repair the shot-up planes.
The Japanese CAP fighters were far out of position when the dive bombers attacked, so they weren't able to engage the dive bombers before they made their attacks.
Akagi and the single bomb dropped by Dick Best, moments before impact. This is a legitimately nice model of Akagi, and even better there are only three fighters on her deck. For all the issues with the visuals, this is something that is based on some of the more recent research about the battle, which has refuted several myths that have been around for decades now.
The narrative in western literature about Midway was heavily influenced by Fuchida Mitsuo, a Japanese airman who was at both Pearl Harbor and Midway. In Japan, he was heavily discredited for revisionism and contradictions of other accounts, but it wasn't until the 21st century that American and Japanese scholars were able to bridge the gap and start setting the western perception of the battle straight.
In regards to Midway, he made the claim that the Kido Butai had it's aircraft fueled, armed, and spotted on the decks when the Americans arrived. This has been known as the 'Fateful Five Minutes', the idea that if the dive bombers arrived just a few minutes later the IJN would have launched a strike that would have demolished the American task forces.
But this is untrue, as the carriers had been shifting back and forth from land attack to naval strike loadouts, and the force had been under sporadic air attack all morning from Midway, which forced rapid cycling of CAP fighters which left no time to spot a strike on the decks. In reality, the Japanese were probably the better part of an hour away from launching a strike towards the American carriers.
One other small thing of note, the bombers are coming in from the wrong side of the ship, over the starboard side rather than the port side. But this is really a minor complaint.
This might be Lieutenant Clarence Earle Dickinson, a pilot in VS-6 who might have been the one who landed the bomb hit atop Kaga's island, which wiped out the bulk of her officers, including her captain.
This looks to be crewmen congratulating Guaido for his boldness in working to save the ship. Sadly, his aircraft would be shot down at Midway, and it is believed that after being interrogated he was killed by being tied to a weight and thrown overboard.
This is Lieutenant Commander Wade McClusky (played by Luke Evans), the commander of VB-6. His initiative at the battle lead the misguided dive bomber force to the Kido Butai, allowing them to make their attack.
This is a downright wonky little sequence, with a Dauntless being chased by at least two Zeros performing a maneuver known as a Hammerhead Stall. The maneuver is a vertical climb, at the last moment a hard kick of the rudder, which flips the plane around so it's pointing down and is able to go in the opposite direction from when it started.
The SBD was a rugged and capable aircraft, but maneuvers like this are not in its ability.
This looks to be the strike on Kaga. While Dick Best took three planes to hit Akagi, the rest of VB-6 and VS-6 focused on Kaga, with devastating results.
In October 2019, the wreck of Kaga was discovered, and a post about that wreck and the history of the ship can be found here: The Wreck of the Kaga
Oddly enough, these Japanese observers seem to be lagging far behind the gunners at spotting the incoming dive bombers.
As has been stated, there are too many shot down and otherwise damaged aircraft in this shot.
Gunners on a twin 25mm mount on one of the Japanese warships. As near as is known, Akagi had fourteen twin 25mm mounts, and Kaga had fifteen of the same.
The dive on Akagi again, based on the portside island.
Dive bombers that carried their munitions on the centerline employed this type of cradle to ensure that the bomb was clear of the propellor.
As has been said, this is a nice model of Akagi. A nice detail is that it has accurately modeled the older 45 caliber 10th Year Type 12 cm guns that comprised her heavy AA battery.
Sources:
General Historical and Technical
Shattered Sword: The Untold Story of the Battle of Midway. Anthony Tully, Johnathan Parshall. (2005)
The First Team: Pacific Air Combat from Pearl Harbor to Midway. John Lundstrom. (1984)
Combat Colors Number 4: Pearl Harbor and Beyond December 1941 to May 1942. Bridgewater, H.C. and Scott, Peter. 2001.
https://ww2db.com/person_bio.php?person_id=98 - Biography of Fuchida Mitsuo.
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/3773334/clarence-earle-dickinson - Information on Clarence Dickinson.
Pearl Harbor
http://www.navweaps.com/index_oob/OOB_WWII_Pacific/OOB_WWII_Pearl_Harbor.php - General Order of Battle
http://www.navsource.org/archives/01/39a.htm - Photos of Arizona
http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USN/ships/dafs/BB/bb39.html - Damage to Arizona
Carrier Raids
http://www.cv6.org/1942/marshalls/default.htm - Marshall Island Raid information pt. 1
http://www.cv6.org/1942/marshalls/marshalls_2.htm - Marshall Island Raid information pt. 2
http://www.cv6.org/1942/doolittle/doolittle.htm - Doolittle Raid information pt. 1
http://www.cv6.org/1942/doolittle/doolittle_2.htm - Doolittle Raid information pt. 2
Midway
http://www.navweaps.com/index_oob/OOB_WWII_Pacific/OOB_WWII_Midway.php - General Order of Battle
http://www.cv6.org/1942/midway/default.htm - USS Enterprise operations at Midway
http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USMC/USMC-M-Midway.html - Information on the Marine forces on Midway.
http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WNJAP_47-45_10ns.php - Akagi's heavy AA gun.
Movie
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt6924650/?ref_=nv_sr_1?ref_=nv_sr_1 - IMDB page with cast information.
Enjoyed the break down, thanks! I assume you have seen the RV Petrel's USS Johnston video, I'm interested to see if you agree with their identifications of the debris of that gallant ship.
ReplyDeleteThank you for the kind comment. I've been busy working on the post about Chokai, so I've only skimmed the video about Johnston so far. She's next on the list though, for what bits of the ship are identifiable at least.
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