Bibliographic Information:
Title: The Day the Series Stopped
Executive Producers: Ryan Fleck
Network: ESPN
Release Date: 2014
Age Rating: N/A
Genre / Format of the Title: Documentary, Sports / Movie
Plot Summary: In 1989, for the first time in decades, the San Francisco Bay Area had a deep divide due to the area's love of baseball as the San Francisco Giants and the Oakland Athletics both went to the World Series against each other. The West side of the Bay rooted for the Giants, and the East for Oakland, but right before game 3 the divide was made even bigger: a 6.9 earthquake rocked the bay area. The largest earthquake in the bay since the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, and this one was just as destructive. While players and fans were relatively safe in the Giants stadium (Candlestick Park) as they quaked, many others were not as lucky. This documentary shows the different perspectives and stories of that fateful day, and the series that stood still as the earth didn’t.
Creator Background: Ryan Fleck is best known for working as part of a duo with Anna Boden as directors. While this documentary was strictly Fleck’s work, it came from a place of passion due to Fleck being a bay area native (born and raised in Berkeley/Oakland). Since this documentary Fleck and Boden have gone on to direct many different films together, including the popular Marvel cinematic piece Captain Marvel (2019) (Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck).
Critical Evaluation: As an A’s fan from the bay area, as well as someone who loves history and documentaries, I feel inclined to say that I am slightly biased towards this documentary and enjoying it. I will say there were some downsides to the movie in general: namely that at the beginning when setting the stage for the rivalry between San Francisco and Oakland there were “overlays” of colors on the film and interviews. Giants players/fans had an orange tint to them, while Athletics fans/players had a green overlay to them (to represent their teams main colors). This was pretty distracting, and in general an interesting choice to make for a sports documentary: simply but, they could have just had the teams logos in the background and it certainly would have gotten the same job done. Thankfully the overlays went away as the coverage switched to the earthquake, but it was still jarring at the beginning. While this certainly is not the greatest documentary about a sporting event, and I am sure someone else could produce something better, it was still relatively entertaining and informative.
Want to see/read more about the quake? Check this out.
Creative Use for a Library Program: The Day the Series Stopped has a lot of potential for library programs: it can be used to show history of the Bay Area and sporting events/natural disasters, it can be used to get children interested into baseball, it can be used as a precautionary tale of how destructive an earthquake can be and how to protect oneself during an earthquake. In fact, my favorite one is the last one: as Californians we tend to shrug off earthquakes because we have not had another big one in a while, which like the bay area population in the 80’s, we take it for granted. Sometimes we need a reminder on how to prepare for an earthquake, and how to react during one.
Speed-Round Recommendation: Take me out to the ball game and get me some peanuts and safety gear because Candlestick park is getting rocked by the Earth itself. It’s 1989 and the San Francisco Giants are against the Oakland A’s for the World Series: it is game three and right before the first pitch a 6.9 earthquake hits the San Francisco Bay Area. Those in the park think it’s all fun and games because the baseball park’s structure kept them safe: but in the bay area things are collapsing and burning. This is the Day the Series Stopped.
The crowd began chanting Queen's song "We Will Rock You" during the earthquake because they did not realize it was a natural disaster and not just fans getting excited. Listen here:
Potential Challenge Issues and Defense Preparation: This one is a challenge, as immediately I could not think of any potential challenge issues that having this documentary could cause. After some reflection I realized that perhaps the biggest challenge is that remembering the events of this historical event would be tragic for anyone who experienced it when it happened and would not want their children to see the events of the day. I would remind them that by telling the story we are honoring those who did pass from the event, and by remembering what happened we can prepare for another potential disaster that will hopefully have less casualties due to us being better prepared.
Reason for Inclusion: While this mini documentary is older than most of the other items in the collection, it was important to be included for many reasons. One is that it shows a historical event that does not fall under “typical” history (war, politics, etc.), as well as the fact that it shows a local history perspective. It also adds diversity to the genres and mediums in my current collection by being the first documentary cataloged, as well as being the first sport based item.
References
Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck. (2017, July 17). Wikipedia.
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