Heroic move and crazy that he beat the odds.
I think they put too much Top Gun into the Buck and Buckie characters--I expected them to take their shirts off and play volleyball at any moment to the Playing with the Boys soundtrack. And I laughed that Buck's hair was always holleywood perfect, even in the Luft stalag, which was annoying.
I think the rest of the characters were well depicted as representative of that generation and the flack scenes were terrifying.