Examining a new ‘Red Baron’ scenario

It’s been 85 years since German flying ace Manfred von Richthofen was shot from the skies above northern France in the final throes of World War I, ending his terrifying string of 80 kills involving Allied aircraft.

But while Royal Air Force Squadron Capt. Roy Brown was generally credited with firing the fatal volley while flying in pursuit of Von Richthofen, tonight’s “Nova” offering, “Who Shot Down the Red Baron?” (8 p.m., KCET), offers a new scenario that suggests otherwise.

Yet the hedging with which the revised conclusion is delivered in the final minutes robs the documentary of its purported payoff, exposing the program for what it is: a retelling of the legendary exploits of Von Richthofen played alongside the remarkable technical evolution of aerial combat from 1914 to 1918.

As such, “Who Shot Down the Red Baron?” does a serviceable job, combining authentic footage of these brave pilots with filmed re-creations. But these latter segments are problematic. The grainy black-and-white images of the real dogfights lose impact when edited onto crisp, full-color new footage.

Pilots fire away in color, and their victims spiral to the ground in black-and-white. It’s more than a little jarring.

More interesting is the psychological profile of the Red Baron from his early days as a pilot-in-training circa 1915 to a battle-weary veteran only a couple of years later. In fact, his mental deterioration as outlined here suggests that his demise may have been as much of a suicide-by-combat as anything else, which would make the title of this documentary rather inconsequential.