China Beach

So you see, one night I couldn't sleep and went down a Jeff Kober rabbit hole, as he's got the kind of voice you can fall asleep to (as a now meditation instructor). I started looking for his meditation talks. Somehow got to a reference/picture of him as Dodger, remembered watching and loving this show as a kid, and decided to give it a buy.It really was a great show. It is quite an 80's show, and a bit dated in places, but still worth a watch. There's so much to be said for the psychology of what people endure in war and the ways they try to cope. The bottling it up inside, the crude jokes or behavior to cope with the stress, the drinking or drugs, the attempt to create events to make people forget the war for just a night and bring them mentally back home. Government psychologists trying to say ptsd wasn't real and forcing unstable young men back out just to fall apart and shaming them by saying they were pretending to be ill to go home. There's so many almost fun and happy moments in this show, and yet such an undercurrent of the neglect and abandonment faced by those who fought or otherwise served in the war. All seen from the eyes of the nurses, almost made helpless to helping those who they knew needed it most, because every few minutes another helicopter was bringing more wounded to them.

The individual disks are not clearly labeled as Season 1, Disk1, Season 1 Disk 2, etc. Good, high quallity video and audio. It was nice listening to the music of the late '60s and early '70s which is frequently playing in the background.

The story is great. The packaging and dvd quality is not. The DVDs are not clearly labeled/organized, but we googled to see the episode order and we’re fine. All in all, we just loved seeing the show again! I remember watching it as a kid.

Just as good as I remembered it from the late 80's-early 90's. Only thing is...I'm older and have minor hearing loss and there's no CC (closed caption) option. So...I just have to turn it up a bit and make sure I'm wearing my hearing aids.

Very disappointed. Video quality is horribly fuzzy, which I could live with. Unfortunately every 30 seconds or so the DVD makes an electronic sound and pauses, then continues. Makes it very difficult to watch the show. Thought it was just on the first DVD, but no, it happens on all the DVD. It’s not my DVD player; I watch lots of DVDs without any problem. China Beach is such a great show, but watching these DVDs are unbearable.

I am so grateful the legal wrangling over copyrights that prevented this collection from China Beach fans has been resolved. Finally we can watch our beloved characters live their turbulent years again. More importantly, again we can come to understand what the men and women of the Vietnam War suffered in The Nam and carried with them back to The World.What was learned from that war and the people who lived it has made major changes in medical treatment, mental services and how service people are reintegrated into peace-time society. There have been great improvements, but as we see what veterans of the Afghan and Iraq wars still suffer, it is obvious still more must be done.Back in the day, I was about the age of the characters in the series. Having missed watching the show in the Eighties, a benighted time when you couldn't watch one channel and tape another, I came to love China Beach the summer of 2000, when it was rebroadcast on TV Land. I was amazed how much I had missed in the Sixties. And not for the reasons you are thinking! I was clean and sober!I started to realize how much politics and history had passed me by as I lived my life back in The World while men and women lived and died a war in The Nam. For me. Vietnam was a war I tried to follow, but couldn't grasp. None of us really did, just as the Middle East wars have confused and frustrated us once again. The complexities of Vietnam went right over my head as I fell for the buzz words: domino theory, pacification, search and destroy. Granted, China Beach and it's network rival, Tour of Duty, also rebroadcast that summer of 2000, opened up lost memories, made concepts finally click. I began to relive that part of my life with clearer understanding.As a result, I started to write. My writings became two books about a young man my age, from my town, who willingly went to Vietnam to fight and came home with issues that he still struggles to resolve. I since have met and spoken to Vietnam vets who live at least some of each day in parallel worlds, trying to be in the present while that old past continues to dig at their innermost peace.China Beach is only a TV show. But it tackled important events and issues that even now have meaning and resonance. Watch it for the pleasure of the stories. Take away from it a deeper meaning that will enrich your life experience.

I love China Beach! But there are no subtitles, no closed captioning. I really need to read the words as I watch. The DVDs play beautifully. But I'm sad that I can't read the words because there are no words to read.

China Beach was my husbands favorite tv show… he loves the videos.