Erased: WW2’s Heroes of Color is an all new documentary series from National Geographic. Executive produced and narrated by Idris Elba, the four episodes detail various battles within World War II and highlight the often ignored people of color who were directly involved in securing the victory of the Allied forces.
Pearl Harbor, D-Day, Dunkirk, and the Battle of the Bulge each receive individual episodes and discuss veterans who fought for the Allied forces. The content in each episode continues the overdue work to shed light on essential figures whose stories were forgotten due to the white-focused history that permeates the culture.
From the black sailors who worked in the mess during Pearl Harbor and took matters into their own hands, to an Indian regiment who worked to evacuate Allied forces at Dunkirk, these stories include never-before-heard audio and stories from the individuals themselves. Unfortunately, each episode follows an accidental format of these veterans fighting in World War II, then coming back home and being ignored or openly hated due to their skin color.
The episodes themselves are filled with intriguing information. Learning about a historical event through a lens that hasn’t been yet excavated is always a thrill. It helps to recontextualize what has come to be “the essential knowledge” about a subject, adding much needed detail to the broad strokes and, again, white-focused situations often told to us starting in school.
What did bum me out was the actual organizational process within the series. Idris Elba’s narration flip-flops between engaging and pedestrian. Often, the copy he’s asked to read mentions how the viewers “have already seen many movies and clips about the war,” but then proceeds to take time to reintroduce these battles. If you are telling me I already know about Pearl Harbor, why add unnecessary fluff to the story by repeating yourself?
Once the exposition is out of the way, each tale is well-explained as they tackle multiple individuals per episode. At one point, Elba begins to discuss an individual in the midst of turmoil at Dunkirk and the dialogue turns juvenile. After tons of meaty content, Elba mentions the unknown history about a featured figure saying “I hope he got out and had a good life.” A weird moment in an otherwise sturdy documentary.
The family of the featured veterans also are interspersed throughout the episodes. While learning how these individuals were outside of the war zones was interesting and added some context to their tales, it unfortunately slowed down the pace of each episode. I’d almost rather a finale episode, interviewing these family members in a round table format.
Is this series the greatest piece of documentary film-making of all-time? No, but the stories told will hopefully continue the too often ignored conversation about how people of color were essential figures in the fight against Nazisim during World War II. If the frequent reminder that we as viewers have seen many films about World War II is anything, I hope it becomes a call to have these stories shared to a wider audience.
Erased: WW2’s Heroes of Color premieres June 3rd at 9/8c on National Geographic. All four episodes will stream June 4th on Disney+ and Hulu.